Same time next year?

So it’s been a while since my last blog update (apologies for that), and the main reason for this is that we’ve all been fairly busy recently!

Recent highlights include:

• Final acceptance of the full 6697km of dark fibre from SSET (28th March);
• Acceptance of delivery and installation of Juniper routing equipment at all 9 core Points of Presence (22nd March);
• Ciena equipment deployment on track for completion by end May;
• Migration plans and timetable nearing completion;

Last week was Networkshop41 at Keele University (which is the subject of the photo), and the weeks leading up to the event get somewhat taken over by planning and preparation, and I personally was absorbed in writing a presentation that the 400 strong pack of delegates would hopefully find interesting. It was a great event, well attended by both delegates and exhibitors, and there was a real buzz throughout the week. The highlight for me was the LoLa demonstration in the opening plenary, but hopefully a lot of the delegates also enjoyed the Janet6 session on the Wednesday morning during which me, 2 other members of the Janet6 project team, and colleagues from SSET and Ciena spent 90 minutes talking through the background, detail and some of the lighter sides of the project. The feedback we received afterwards was really positive so fingers crossed everyone took something useful from the session.

This year was my 5th Networkshop and was by a long way my most memorable. My first one was in Manchester in 2005 when I didn’t know anyone and no one knew me, I attended talks and didn’t do a great deal else. This year was different – I knew customers, customers knew me, I knew suppliers, suppliers knew me, and I presented in a plenary session which helps! You can’t put into words how productive it can be being in a room full of customers and suppliers, and worries about a week away meaning I fell behind with ‘the day job’ were quickly eradicated as I found myself talking to all sorts of people about every aspect of the Janet6 project.

It’s also worth noting that back in 2005 I don’t think Twitter existed, and prior to Networkshop40 last year in York I’d barely heard of it and never used it. The modern social media age that we now live in means that there’s a constant supply of information available to everyone everywhere about literally everything, and the #nws41 twitter hashtag proved to be an incredible source of information and opinion. I tend to get a bit carried away with these things at conferences (and then go quiet for the rest of the year), I tend to tweet photos of sessions I’m in, presenters I know or find interesting, and other random scenes I come across during the week. Feedback from a colleague back at Janet HQ was “Enjoying all the tweets from #nws41 - feels like we're actually there - please keep them up”, which sums it up perfectly.

And I couldn’t write this blog without a mention for the #orangeshirts. Every Networkshop, students from the host University act as helpers - microphone running during sessions, handing out conference packs and generally making sure everyone is being looked after. At Keele this year they quickly latched onto the #nws41 hashtag and joined in the Twitter fun, but then decided that they wanted their own hashtag, and so #orangeshirts was born – a tribute to the brightly coloured Janet branded clothes they had to wear. The wider conference population embraced this and for the first time in Networkshop history the delegates and the helpers became one :)

A selection of such tweets:

“The #orangeshirts have set the benchmark for future Networkshops for delegate interaction, helpfulness, and twitter fun. Awesome work!”

“Only at #nws41 will you find people in a queue for coffee chatting about the #orangeshirts hashtag.”

“Many thanks to the #orangeshirts for all they're doing at #nws41!”

“Loving the helpfulness and upbeat excitement coming from the #nws41 #orangeshirts guys!”