Free Bletchley Park Tours: The When and the How
As a free bonus for all Over the Air attendees, we have organized site tours of our historic Venue, Bletchley Park on both Friday September 30th and Saturday October 1st. The tours will take about one and a half hours and will cover all the main points of interest around the site and tell the story of how the Enigma and Lorenz codes were broken during World Word Two.
There will be three tours on Friday, running at 14:15, 15:00 and 15:30, and two tours on Saturday, running at 10:00 and 10:30 (perfect for family members who might be coming up on the Saturday to see what all the fuss is about). If you want to go on one of these tours, please gather outside the main entrance of the mansion five minutes before the tour start time.
Google+ APIs at Over the Air
Yesterday, Google announced the highly anticipated launch of their developer platform for Google+. We're very excited to announce that Google's Ade Oshineye will be on stage at Over the Air to give attendees the scoop on how to use this new social platform.
The Bill will be on the Bill
One topic we'll be covering closely at Over the Air this year (in line with our high-security venue) will be mobile security! We are very lucky to have on the program Andy Williams from the Metropolitan Police's National Mobile Phone Crime Unit is going to tell us about his work there and will be challenging developers to create applications that can help with the lost / stolen mobile situation.
Ignite Bletchley Park
Even if you can't join us for the full OTA11 event, you should definitely try to make it out to Bletchley Park for Friday evening, as we will be introducing an exciting new element to the programme:
Ignite is a global event, organized by volunteers, where participants are given five minutes to speak about their ideas and personal or professional passions, accompanied by 20 slides. Each slide is displayed for 15 seconds, and slides are automatically advanced. The Ignite format is similar to Pecha Kucha, which features 20 slides displayed for 20 seconds each. The presentations are meant to "ignite" the audience on a subject, i.e. to generate awareness and to stimulate thought and action on the subjects- Wikipedia
The event-within-an-event is being organised by Ignite Cardiff's very own Claire Scantlebury, and the submission form is still open for speakers to come along and volunteer to give a five minute talk. The rule is - you can't talk about yourself or your job (so no blatant self-promotion is allowed) but if you're passionate about something or want to talk about something cool and innovative then just fill in the form behind the link above and we'll be in touch.
See you on Friday night!
Opening Speaker - Bill Thompson
We are thrilled to announce that our opening speaker is Bill Thompson of the BBC, who will be taking a philosophical look at the way the proliferation of online and mobile has changed society and will introduce the Digital Public Space as a concept which will potentially change the landscape of society and the internet.
New media pioneer Bill Thompson is a journalist, commentator and technology critic based in Cambridge, England. He has been working in, on and around the Internet since 1984. He contributes to other publications both on and off-line, including The Guardian and The New Statesman. He writes a monthly column for new net users for BBC WebWise, and a technology column for Focus magazine
Bill appears weekly on ‘Click‘ (formerly ‘Digital Planet’ and ‘Go Digital’) on the BBC World Service and occasionally on other BBC radio and television programmes. You can find him online, working in one of Cambridge’s many cafés, or at the bar of the ICA.
Ewan Spence
Ewan is known for his strong views on mobile technology and ensuring assessibility to it all; a love of trivia; the new media landscape on the internet; the effect technology and communication will have on the public conscious and existing businesses.
He has been active in this space for over ten years, working for a number of sites, publications and media companies, some for long periods of time, others for commissions, one-off pieces or a series of articles or shows.
As Scotland’s first podcaster, he's been a prominent voice in the rise of podcasting and new media online, picking up a BAFTA nomination for my coverage of the Edinburgh Fringe along the way.
At Ignite Bletchley Park, Ewan will be talking about 'Everything I ever needed to know about European politics I learned from the Eurovision Song Contest'
www.ewanspence.com
http://twitter.com/#!/ewan
Alistair MacDonald
Alistair is a self-confessed geek with a fascination for transport. By trade he is a real-time software developer and radio travel presenter, two completely different skills that often get mixed up in his "pet projects". Currently Alistair is working with the start-up Usable HQ Ltd.
At Ignite Bletchley Park, Alistair will be talking about 'The Metro Simulator. Simulating a light transport system on a web server'
http://www.agm.me.uk/blog
http://twitter.com/#!/alistair
Terence Eden
Terence Eden has been working on the mobile Internet since long before it was fashionable. He consults on QR codes, mobile strategy, and mobile security matters.
His work has featured in Wired, The Guardian, The Register, and Now Celebrity Weddings.
At Ignite Bletchley Park, Terence will be talking about 'QRpedia - linking museums and Wikipedia with QR codes'.
http://shkspr.mobi/blog/
http://twitter.com/#!/edent
James Hugman
James is a geek living in Brighton. Despite being on the internet since 1991, he doesn't have a tan, and is not an anarchist. At Ignite Bletchlye Park, James will be talking about 'The Technologies of a Modern Revolution'.
http://hugman.posterous.com
www.twitter.com/jhugman
Chris Monk
Chris is a carer, educationalist, once a teacher and now volunteer at The National Museum of Computing at Bletchley Park. He is keen to encourage young people to learn about computing and whenever possible to get them to experience learning outside the classroom.
At Ignite Bletchley Park, Chris will be talking about 'Kids can't code' and has asked that you show your support for the National Museum of Computing by tweeting using #tnmoc.
www.tnmoc.org
www.twitter.com/ChrisMonk_oo
Dr Alex Blewitt
Dr Alex Blewitt is passionate supporter of both OSGi and Eclipse, having first been introduced before the release of Eclipse 1.0, and getting involved in the open-source project just before the OSGitransition happened with the release of Eclipse 3.0. He was nominated (and a top three finalist) for Eclipse Ambassador in 2007, as recognition of his contributions as chief editorEclipseZone.
Alex spent many years working with Java, having founded International Object Solutions Limited in 1997, just after Java 1.1 was released. Now he spends his time development on mobile platforms at Bandlem Limited, which he founded in 2010. Alex currently writes for InfoQ covering both OSGi and Eclipse, and continues to develop modular applications in his spare time. His ObjectivEClipseproject was used as the basis for the Sony Snap Developer IDE, and many are using the ZFS port on OSX, which he maintains. In what little time he has left over, he spends with his young family and has been known to take them flying if the weather's nice.
At Ignite Bletchley Park, Alex will be talking about 'Git and Gerrit for Distributed Code Review'.
http://alblue.bandlem.com
www.twitter.com/alblue
Imran Ghory
Imran used to work in the city figuring out how currencies worked, until he discovered that it was much more fun to make up your own job. He now focuses full-time on geeky side-projects, drawing a web-comic and blogging. He accidentally built up expertise in the startup world so occasionally does consultancy and lecturing in the field.
At Ignite Bletchley Park, Imran Will be talking about 'Cracking Cryptics'.
OTA11 Schedule
Here is the schedule for Over the Air 2011 - although it is always subject to slight shifts as we confirm with all of our speakers, the timings are now set in stone, and there shouldn't be any major changes.
| Friday, 30 September 2011 | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 9:30 to 10:00 | Registration / Coffee Marquee Tent | |||||
| 10:00 to 11:00 | Welcome from the Over the Air Team Marquee Tent Daniel Appelquist, Matthew Cashmore, Margaret Gold Opening Keynote: Dr. Sue Black: Building Bletchley Park |
|||||
| 11:00 to 11:15 | Coffee Break Marquee Tent | |||||
| Ball Room | Drawing Room | Music Room | Library | Marquee Corner | ||
| 11:15 to 12:15 | Connected apps: delivering great user experiences using content rich APIs Dan Murphy and Stephanie Seegmuller, Pearson; Steve Ellis, Metia; Greg Taylor, TigerSpike |
Excellence in the Android User Experience Nick Butcher, Google |
I may not make you a millionaire - but I will pay for your beer Terence Eden, inMobi |
Stolen and lost phones – can mobile applications help with this problem? Andy Williams, Metropolitan Police Service |
Green Your Apps: an intro to using AMEEconnect James Smith, AMEE |
|
| 12:15 to 13:15 | BBC Digital Public Space (“Spindle”) Mo McRoberts, BBC |
Web Anywhere: Mobile Optimisation With HTML5, CSS3, JavaScript - Bruce Lawson, Opera Software | Game technologies - putting them to good use in AR Paul Foster, Microsoft |
Mobile Application Security and Mobile Security Applications: Sticks and Carrots Craig Heath |
Android Survival Guide: tips and tricks After Two Years of Development Alfredo Morresi |
|
| 13:15 to 14:30 | Lunch The Lawn | |||||
| 14:30 to 15:30 | On Your Markers...: Getting started with 3D Augmented Reality Ivan Trajkovic, NudgeNudge |
Crap! It Doesn't Look Quite Right: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Set my Mobile Web Sites Free Lyza Danger Gardner |
Open Source Hardware Paul Downey, SolderPad |
Design for All goes Mobile Denise Stephens, Enabled by Design and John Wyer, Vodafone |
Wholesale Application Community (WAC) APIs Ricardo Varela, WAC; Kevin Smith, Vodafone |
|
| 15:30 to 16:30 | Exploding the Gap Between Native and Web James Hugman, Future Platforms |
Google+ APIs Intro Ade Oshineye, Google |
Arduino ADK / Android Francisco Javier Zorzano Mier, Telefónica I&D; David Cuartielles, Arduino |
Hands on with the BlueVia APIs Bernhard Walter, BlueVia |
Storytelling, Games, and the Real World: Weaving it all Together Adrian Hon and Alex Macmillan, Six to Start |
|
| 16:30 to 17:00 | Break | |||||
| 17:00 to 18:00 | The Rubber Ducky's Guide to Open Government Data Hadley Beeman, Glyn Wintle |
Debugging Web Apps on Real Mobile Devices Dale Lane, IBM |
OpenBTS - Open Source GSM Network for Development and Testing Will Rogers, Detica |
BlueVia Labs. Hands on with #Blue and some other surprises! Richard Spence and Paul Golding, BlueVia |
Ubiquitous Android Jamie McDonald, Novoda |
|
| 18:00 to 19:00 | Securing your Internet Fridge: Web Security in a Networked Society Kristoffer Gronowski & Oscar Ohlsson, Ericsson Labs |
Session: Native [heart] Web (HTML5: Building Great Mobile Web Apps and More With Web Standards) Dominique Hazaël-Massieux, W3C |
Mobile Mindstorms -- LEGO robots with Android (and iOS) Adam Cohen-Rose |
From zero to App-Super-Hero with Titanium Liz Myers |
Guardian APIs Workshop Michael Brunton-Spall, The Guardian |
|
| 19:00 to 22:00 | Dinner, Drinks and Ignite Bletchley Park Talks Marquee Tent ![]() BBC's Bill Thompson and others... |
|||||
| 23:00 ...and beyond |
All-night hacking Various Rooms in the Mansion | |||||
| Saturday, 1 October, 2011 | ||||||
| 7:30 to 8:00 | Wake Up: Revitaliser Workshop The Lawn | |||||
| 8:00 to 9:00 | Breakfast Marquee Tent | |||||
| Morning Sessions | ||||||
| Ball Room | Drawing Room | Music Room | Library | Marquee Corner | ||
| 9:30 to 10:30 | The News. 27 Languages. One App. David Vella, BBC World Service |
The FT Web app - We've Got a Website for That Andrew Betts, Assanka |
QR Codes Under the Bonnet Alistair MacDonald |
|||
| 10:30 to 11:30 | Panel: Apps for Science Brian Fuchs, Imperial College London |
Navigating the Myriad of Mobile Payment Methods Anthony Hicks, Paypal |
What’s going on with security in the mobile industry and what’s coming up? Charles Brookson, Zeeta Security Ltd. |
Developing Network-Friendly Applications: A Mobile Operator’s View Kamran Kordi, Deutsche Telekom |
||
| 11:30 to 12:30 | Developing Apps That Transform An Enterprise - Some Lessons Learned Paul Johnston |
Historical Code Cracking with Phones: What if Pontus, the Gauls, Germans, Nervii, Egyptians and Helvetii had iPhones? David Rogers, Copper Horse Solutions |
Mobile UI and fried chicken (or how angry birds will kill us all) Arran Ross-Paterson |
Mobile Web Apps: State of the Tools Ernesto Jiménez, Vodafone |
Location Based Services and Privacy (it's not just where you are but who you're with) Steve Kennedy |
|
| 12:30 to 13:30 | Session: A better world – one mobile & web start-up at a time Franco Papeschi, Web Foundation |
Mobile Augmented Reality with junaio - easily creating own AR experience Frank Angermann, Metaio |
“Im in ur codez” or, Securing Mobile Apps Nick Shearer, Mobile Interactive Group |
NetMash: Native + Web + More Duncan Cragg, Thoughtworks |
||
| 13:45 to 14:30 | Lunch Marquee Tent | |||||
| 14:30 to 14:50 | Closing Keynote: Professor Fred Piper The Changing Face of Cryptography Marquee Tent | |||||
| 14:50 to 16:00 | Competition Presentations Marquee Tent | |||||
| 16:00 to 16:30 | Break for Judging | |||||
| 16:30 to 17:30 | Awards & Wrap-up Marquee Tent | |||||
BBC Digital Public Space Project
We're exited to announce that Mo McRoberts from BBC will be presenting on the BBC's Digital Public Space Project at this year's Over the Air. You can learn more about this exciting project in Mo's blog post on BBC's Internet Blog.
What’s New at Over the Air? How about 3D Augmented Reality?
What happens when you take Augmented Reality and put it together with new glasses-free 3d phone display technology? We're about to find out. We're very excited to announce that the folks from NudgeNudge will be running a workshop on building 3D AR apps at this year's Over the Air. Roll up to get hands-on with this exciting new technology.
Security Stream at OTA 2011
Bletchley Park is renowned for its mathematics work in breaking encryption during the second world war. It is also the home of the world’s first programmable digital computer: Colossus and the National Museum of Computing. Where better to hold a security stream for Over the Air?
Security in the mobile world is increasing in prominence. Convergence of technologies within mobile handsets mean that more people have more reason to attack mobile phones and their users. From mobile payments and company emails to our photo albums, our entire lives are centring on one thing – the handset. If we lose our phone it is more than a big deal.
As we all get hooked on our connected lives, malware and virus creators are thinking of new dastardly ways to wreak havoc and steal money from us and even from the developers of the applications we download. Developers need to think more and more about how to protect their own applications and user data, alongside being responsible with the private data they have access to.
Speakers in the Over the Air security stream will be giving attendees the low-down on how to secure mobile applications, the evolution of malware and the history of codes and ciphers:
- What’s going on with security in the mobile industry and what’s coming up?
- The threat from mobile malware and how to make sure you don’t develop something bad
- Stolen and lost phones – can mobile applications help with this problem?
- Webapp security, signing and app stores
- Break the code! – A mobile application challenge for developers
Stay-tuned for Speaker Announcements....
Over the Air 2011 Session Proposals will soon close

Every year we invite mobile technologists & enthusiasts to propose workshop topics and help create the kind of hands-on technical sessions, inspirational talks, and knowledge-sharing round-tables that they themselves are most interested in attending. Sponsors are offered the opportunity to run workshops as well, but this is by the community for the community - no price tag attached!
We opened up the workshop proposals form on July 5th for OTA11, and thanks to the fantastic response, we already have a fantastic draft schedule put together. Workshops include sessions about the mobile Web, Apps of various stripes, hardware hacking, mobile development in emerging markets, design & user experience, open data & APIs, games, mobile film, and (of course, given our setting at Bletchley Park) security and cryptography.
The Schedule for Over The Air 2010
While we put together the details for Over the Air 2011, you can refer to last year's programme as a rough guide to the format and timing of the event, which will stay largely the same.
| Friday, 10 September 2010 | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 9:00 to 10:00 |
Registration / Coffee [Dining Hall, Ground Floor, Sherfield Building] | |||||
| 10:00 to 11:00 |
Welcome, Logistics, Etc... Daniel Appelquist, Matthew Cashmore & team Keynote: Aral Balkan: The Art of Emotional Design [Great Hall, Sherfield Building] |
|||||
| 11:00 to 11:15 |
Coffee Break [Dining Hall, Ground Floor, Sherfield Building] | |||||
| Huxley 311 | Huxley 340 | Huxley 341 | Huxley 342 | Huxley 343 | Huxley 344B | |
| 11:15 to 12:15 |
HTML5 on Mobile Bruce Lawson, Opera Software |
Hacking with #Blue Richard Spence, O2 |
AIR for Android Michaël Chaize, Adobe |
What have The Guardian Ever Done For US? Michael Brunton Spall, The Guardian |
DIY Research Workshop - Informing the Design Process Mark A.M. Kramer |
|
| 12:15 to 13:15 |
Improving Your Problem Solving Skills Rhiannon Horsley and Analia Lemmo, UnLtd |
Tapping Into The Enterprise Market Richard Pulliam, Alcatel |
Android: It's not Just About Phones Kevin McDonagh |
Orange Mobilise - the Mobile Volunteering Initiative David Simoes-Brown, 100% Open Jogesh Limbani, Orange R&D UK |
Openplaques. org, Hunting Down The History Around You
Jez Nicholson |
|
| 13:15 to 14:30 |
Lunch [Dining Hall, Ground Floor, Sherfield Building] | |||||
| 14:30 to 15:30 |
Rethinking the Mobile Web - A Pragmatic Look At Creating An Accessible and Inclusive Mobile Experience Bryan and Stephanie Rieger, Yiibu |
In-App Payments Using Paypal Anthony Hicks & Saulius Zukauskas, Paypal |
Prototyping for the iPhone with iProcessing Durrell Bishop and Tom Hulbert, Luckybite |
The Mobile Opportunity in the Developing World Raj Singh |
Pachube's "Porthole" Software: Augmented Reality Chrisopher Burman, Pachube |
Developing Federated (Mobile) Social Networks with One Social Web Diana Cheng, Vodafone R&D |
| 15:30 to 16:30 |
Emerging Comms: How html5 changes applications and the way they talk
Vladimir Katardjiev, Ericsson Labs |
Mobile Application Testing Workshop with Device Anywhere Leila Modarres, Device Anywhere |
Viral Survival Kit: Cloud Computing for Highly Scalable Apps Matt Wood, Amazon Web Services |
Connecting the Real World With Your Mobile! Geoff Ballinger |
Rapid Mobile Prototyping with Flowella Tim Brooke, Nokia |
|
| 16:30 to 17:00 |
Break | |||||
| 17:00 to 18:00 |
What Would Picasso Do? - A Panel of Art And Technology Bryan Rieger, Jason Fields, Tom Hume, mills™, Mathias Dahlstrom |
Qt - productive app development for desktops and smartphones Pekka Kosonen, Nokia |
Building apps with data.gov.uk Richard Stirling |
mHealth Brian Fuchs and Vasa Curcin |
App Development In The New World Of Windows Phone 7 Paul Foster, Microsoft |
Android Localisation Karan Deep Geddam, Motodev (Motorola) |
| 18:00 to 19:00 | Bombs Away: A Location- based Game that WILL Make You Run Richard Vahrman, Locomatrix |
It's All About Location, Multitasking & Gyroscopes Jim Brown, CTO of Cloudmade |
W3C Mobile Standards Robin Berjon Kai Hendry |
JavaScript apps for Nokia devices – state of the union and hands-on hacking Petro Soininen, Nokia |
DIY Mobile Design & Usability Testing Belén Baros Pena |
DIY PR Lauren McGregor, Lisa Devaney |
| 19:00 to 22:00 |
Dinner & Chill-out Lounge [Dining Hall, Ground Floor, Sherfield Building] | |||||
| 23:00 ...and beyond |
All-night hack-a-thon [Great Hall, Sherfield Building] | |||||
| Saturday, 11 September, 2010 | ||||||
| 7:15 to 8:00 |
Wake Up: Qi Gong Revitaliser workshop with Gong Fu London | |||||
| 8:00 to 9:00 | Breakfast [Dining Hall, Ground Floor, Sherfield Building] | |||||
| 9:00 to 10:00 | Saturday Keynotes Pawan Gandhi on Ovi Life Tools in Emerging Markets Sir Tim Berners-Lee on Open Data [Great Hall, Sherfield Building] |
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|
|
Morning Sessions - Huxley Building |
|||||
| Huxley 311 | Huxley 340 | Huxley 341 | Huxley 342 | Huxley 343 | Huxley 344B | |
| 10:30 to 11:20 |
Designing the Internet of Things Alexandra Deschamps-Sonsino |
Designing mobile services for emerging market users Alan Wilkinson - Nokia |
Privacy for Developers Kasey Chappelle & Ricardo Varela, Vodafone |
Pitch Workshop Penny Jackson & David Terrar, DCKTN |
||
| 11:20 to 12:10 |
Kiss The End user Goodbye Ivanka Majic, Canonical |
The Emerging Technology of Web Fonts Vladimir Levantovsky - Monotype Imaging |
The New Digital Divide (Or...I Don't Think That Word Means What You Think It Means :-) Stephanie Rieger, Yiibu |
Android Hands-On With the Cycle Hire Widget Kenton Price & Reuben Harris, Little Fluffy Toys Ltd. |
||
| 12:10 to 13:00 |
Exploring The Far Reaches of The Mobile Interaction Continuum Paul Coulton |
Tap it! Designing Awesome Mobile Experiences Brian Fling |
Entrepreneurs on the Mobile Web in Ghana Steve Wolak, Vodafone |
Bringin’ Home the Bacon – The Economics of Your Ad Supported Application Business Limvirak Chea, InMobi |
||
| 13:00 to 14:00 |
Lunch [Dining Hall, Ground Floor, Sherfield Building] | |||||
| 14:00 to 15:00 |
Competition Presentations [Great Hall, Sherfield Building] | |||||
| 15:00 to 15:30 |
Break for Judging | |||||
| 15:30 to 16:30 |
Awards & Wrap-up [Great Hall, Sherfield Building] | |||||
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