What data do people want for GovHackNZ?
Shaun McGirr
Public
Seen by 187
Throw your ideas in here, discuss and a bit later on let's get voting.
Jo Booth Sat 6 Jun 2015 9:27PM
That's a great idea. There was the national broadband map which mapped demand and providers, but free or open WiFi providers would be a very useful thing to aggregate. With the free cbd wifi or equivalent in many cities there should be some data on the terms of each one.
Shaun McGirr Mon 8 Jun 2015 1:08AM
Whom could we ask for this?
Jo Booth Mon 8 Jun 2015 1:56AM
@shaunmcgirr1 it looks like MED 'have' it - but the lovely people at Koordinates run the 'map' part of the Broadband Map now.. http://broadbandmap.govt.nz/we-re-moving/
In fact:
https://koordinates.com/set/927-wireless-broadband-providers/
There is a REST and SOAP API http://broadbandmap.govt.nz/information-for-developers/
But this is mainly commercial wireless providers -- not the 'free' 'open' kind.
Shaun McGirr Mon 8 Jun 2015 10:09AM
I think we'll have to leave it to a GovHack team to take wacky images like this (http://cbdfree.co.nz/img/zones.png) and this (http://freewifi.trademe.co.nz/) and make a map layer that Koordinates could consume. If we can get a specific "ask" together, we could go to Spark and others and ask for their wifi coverage maps in a machine-readable format too.
Peter W, would you like to lead such a team for GovHack?
Peter W Mon 8 Jun 2015 11:06PM
I probably shouldn't take anything on other than just trying to get to Aukland (via bike, from Christchurch, so that'll keep me pretty busy). But it looks like there data is online at least from Spark, maybe it wouldn't be too hard to get: http://www.spark.co.nz/chch/?wifi
Jo Booth Tue 9 Jun 2015 3:05AM
Jamie from NZRS said he was keen to attend - he's likely got a handle on networks in New Zealand.
Shaun McGirr Tue 9 Jun 2015 3:51AM
Cool can you make sure he sees our event page? I like to send people this one: http://govhackwellington.nz/pages/about.html
Jamie - NZRS Tue 9 Jun 2015 9:34AM
Hey Shaun/Jo etal...
The data on old and new broadband maps is older, and not what you are looking for, I would guess.
Mapping coverage from hotspots I would not recommend but there are some starting points for data. The caveat I add is I don't know how this data is licensed.
Here is one starting point of machine readable data.
http://www.zenbu.net.nz/new-zealand-wi-fi-hotspots-map.php
On the assumption Spark has turned every payphone into a hotspot (which I think they pretty much have bar some odd cases) - here is a pretty usable data set:
https://koordinates.com/layer/507-nz-payphone-locations/
I am going to request of a couple of providers their XY and/or address data of hotspots, and add that in. You can geocode address to XY quite easily.
Shaun McGirr Thu 11 Jun 2015 8:01PM
Thanks Jamie, let us know when you get it.
Peter W · Sat 6 Jun 2015 4:25AM
As a traveler without a large mobile data plan, I'd like to know where I can find wifi in towns in NZ. I know some Spark payphones have wifi so ideally I'd love to see a dataset that shows which payphones have wifi (not sure if the gov has that though). Hopefully this isn't too off topic!