Developer Resources

Moving Civic Tech from Code to Products: AWS Marketplace is the New Github

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Smart Chicago has been in civic tech since our inception. No other civic tech outfit in the country has done more to support the Chicago ecosystem, (funds, meeting space, contracts, hackathons, office space, server space) influence the field nationally (CUTGroup, support for the Code for America Brigade, a focus on justice and economic development for all) and produce our own tech (Chicago Works For You, Chicago Health Atlas, Foodborne Chicago, and more).

A focus on all, not just the most technical people

As we’ve grown, we’ve moved away from a focus on the highest-capacity tech people in the space. That move was pretty well-covered here in Civicist: The Real Heart of Civic Tech Isn’t Code. We simply think there is more good to be had by focusing on minting new tech workers in programs like Smart Health Centers, Documenters, and Youth-Led Tech.

An unprecedented technical infrastructure program

Yet we continue to quietly serve the needs of developers— in the footer, without fanfare, for free. Again, no other organization— local or national— has anything like this program. Some of the best developers in the city—Chris Gansen and Scott Robbin— have run it for us over the years, and we’ve been helpful to dozens of local developers.

Uturn Data Solutions has been maintaining the Developer Resources program for the last year or so. Amazon introduced us to Uturn because we were the largest customer in their government division— that’s no small measure of impact. Uturn continues to help us grow the program, as the Illinois Sunshine project from the Illinois Campaign for Political Reform is coming on board this month, adding more tech to our infrastructure.

We can’t ignore the lack of impact for civic tech tools

15335045039_c4477de0c0_kBut I have watched with growing concern the lack of impact of pure tech. The tools we’ve made in civic tech have, frankly, not amounted to much. There are no break-out successes with millions of users. There is very slow uptake and re-use of new tools. And yet we still code.

I think there are a number of modes of operation that preclude big impact— holding our events on the high floors of expensive downtown real estate, for instance. This keeps us far away from people in need.

Another reason is the way we propagate our work product.

Civic tech people love code. They love making code, they love talking about code amongst themselves, and they love publishing code on Github. The culture, since the inception of our movement, has been focused on code and tech rather than functionality and need.

This means that in order for a non-technical person to duplicate the functionality they see in a new “fork our code!” website, they have to hire a developer to do so. There’s just too much friction here— we have to fix it.

Amazon’s AWS Marketplace is better than Github for deploying civic tech websites

At Smart Chicago, we think we have a part of the answer: create and deploy Amazon Machine Images (AMIs) of civic tech functionality and sell it in Amazon’s AWS Marketplace. Here’s how Amazon describes an AMI:

An Amazon Machine Image (AMI) contains all the information necessary to boot an Amazon EC2 instance with your software. An AMI is like a template of a computer’s root volume. For example, an AMI might contain the software to act as a web server (Linux, Apache, and your web site) or it might contain the software to act as a Hadoop node (Linux, Hadoop, and a custom application)

From our perspective, an AMI is just a Github bucket that delivers on the promise of the raw code. We can conflate the two separate tasks we’ve been supporting for years (helping developers create code and helping organizations host their sites) into one simple experience.

AWS Marketplace is an online store that helps customers find, buy, and immediately start using the software and services they need. To date, it has been used mainly for pieces of functionality that corporations need to run an IT infrastructure— security, business processes, Sharepoint, whatever.

But when I look at the AWS Marketplace, I see a new way to get the great work we’ve done in civic tech in the hands of the people who need it most. With a software product listed in the AWS Marketplace, anyone can set up their own site by providing a credit card and filling out a form.

This week, Uturn Data Solutions, in partnership with Smart Chicago, will be launching their first civic tech AMI in the AWS marketplace. It will be the first, but hopefully not last, civic tech product of this kind to be packaged and distributed this way. A change for the better, stay tuned for more!”

Civic Tech Hero: Scott Robbin

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Scott RobbinSince October 2013, civic tech pioneer, Chicago web developer, and good friend Scott Robbin has been working with Smart Chicago as our lead developer. If you have worked at all with us since then, you have benefitted from his work. Let’s take a look:

This is a ton of work. But at Smart Chicago, we’re not all about the technology. Scott has been a patient mentor for developers, teaching them how to use our resources, advising them on how to build their sites. He’s helped us work with non-technical consultants to keep them on the path to being bona-fide Web project managers. And he’s generally shared his vast knowledge in a patented, gentle, learned way. Scott Robbin is a treasure.

On a personal note, I’ve known Scott for many years, and we’ve worked on a volunteer basis on all sorts of projects. Most recently, we worked together to scrape, display, and make available for download every Comment on FCC Filing 14-28, Protecting and Promoting the Open Internet. We work. All we care about is work.

All hail Scott Robbin.

Smart Chicago, Expunge.io, and Ecosystem

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This is one in a series of posts that help us at Smart Chicago to develop a cohesive product strategy that helps us deliver on the promise of access, skills, and data. As we’ve grown, more and more cities have an interest in how Smart Chicago works and how the model can be used near them. These detailed posts, showing all of the steps we take, are a way to keep us in check locally while be of service nationally. Here’s more information on our model.

Expunge.io is a youth-led project.

Continue reading →

The Launch of the CUTGroup Book

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Today we’re launching a website and book, The CUTGroup Book,  http://www.cutgroupbook.org/, centered around propagating the components, tools, and methods of our Civic User Testing Group (CUTGroup) program.

The CUTGroup is a set of regular Chicago residents who get paid to test civic apps. We started the program in February 2013 and it has grown to include 800 people. We’ve learned a lot and we want to share.

We cover the hardware and software you need, methods for tester and developer recruitment, test design, location scouting, and results analysis. We show detailed budgets, exact website configurations, complete text of recruitment emails, the raw results of every test we’ve conducted, and all the other nuts and bolts it takes to make a CUTGroup in your city.

You can download a PDF of the book for free or order it as a real book on Amazon. Also read about the contributions of dozens of people who made this thing happen.

CUTGroup_Cover

All hail the people of CUTGroup!

Developer Resource: Twilio

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We love text.

And as big fans of texting, Smart Chicago has had Twilio as part of our offerings for civic developers since the say we started the program.  We’ve recently expanded our partnership with Twilio, and their local developer relations guru, Greg Bagues, to offer Twilio as a separate service through Smart Chicago. Twilio is a great product that makes it easy to create apps that can make and receive both calls and texts.

 

Healthnear.me

We use it in our own products:

We are also a customer of Textizen, which uses Twilio, including around the Creative Chicago Expo. Civic software developers like Chris Gansen use it to power apps like HealthNearMe.

Like we said, we’re big fans of texting. If you’re new to Twilio, we’ve put together a how-to post of how the app works.

If you’re a civic developer and are interested in using Twilio for your app, please fill out the form below.

The Glories of User Testing: Chicago Early Learning

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In late 2012, after a short development process, we launched an initial version of our project called Chicago Early Learning.

Chicago Early Learning

The first manifestation of a search results page for ChicagoEarly Learning.

An active regime of testing

Then, in the ensuing months, we actively listened to regular Chicago residents, dutifully noted their feedback, and directly changed the site so that it worked better for our target audience of Chicago parents and guardians looking for early childhood education. Here’s a review of the process and the results.

CPS Head Start Policy Committee Meeting

We showed the site on a typical computer set up inside a Chicago Public School location.

CPS Head Start Policy Committee Meeting

We demonstrated the site at a CPS Head Start Policy Committee Meeting At Zenos Colman Elementary School, 4650 S. Dearborn.

Presenting the Early Childhood Portal as 37th Ward Alderman Emma Mitts Looks On

We presented the site to block club leaders inside the ward office of as 37th Ward Alderman Emma Mitts.

User Testing, Chicago Early Learning

We also tested the site in formal environments inside Action for Children locations in Chicago.

Changes to the site based on user feedback

Softer, less map-y design

We completely overhauled the look & feel of the site, making it softer and more rounded. Lots of users we talked to had childcare needs in different areas of the city or related to different parts of their lives (home, work, and relatives, for instance).  For this reason, we also moved away from a stark search box and toward explanations of how to approach the site. We added explanatory text that short-circuited the most common question.  We also moved from book imagery to a crayon/ marker in the logo to better reflect the programs that parents were looking for.

Chicago Early Learning, Relaunch, September 2013

More prominent text feature

The text feature, which allows residents to text a zip code to a special number and receive a set of nearby location, was very popular in testing. We did notice that texting was hidden in the navigation, so we added a paragraph highlighting the feature. We also made the text phone number easier to see and share by giving it a separate page with a separate URL.

Text feature on Chicago Early Learning

Improved search that helped you along

We saw that many people started off their search with a location in mind, whether it was a school or a neighborhood. We moved away from a pure address search and now pre-populate the search box as the user types. This short-circuits the search process and makes people immediately feel like this is a place that has what they’re looking for. The “Browse by community” function provides another way for people to dive in without putting in an exact address.

Chicago Early Learning Search for "kid"

Improved filtering for more user control

We found in testing that people did not know how to easily drill down into search results and they very rarely used the filtering feature. We made the filtering more prominent and took up much more screen real estate with details of the search results. Previously, the user had to click on a particular item on the map to reveal details. An overall insight we observed from testing was that the map is not the thing—the details of early learning centers was the thing. We changed the interface to reflect this.

Chicago Early Learning Search

Better comparisons– more locations, easier to share

One thing we heard loud and clear from parents was that they wanted to be able to compare more than two locations. In response, we completely changed the comparison system—changing it to a more recognizable star / favorite system, displaying starred items in a grid, and giving the user the flexibility to easily add and remove locations.

Chicago Early Learning Compare

Admin tool for management beyond the spreadsheet

An important milestone in this reporting period is the creation of an easy-to-use admin tool to manage all of the locations. Previously, the site was run by a “magic spreadsheet” that was difficult to manage. The Django admin interface to the rescue!

Site administration Chicago Early Learning Portal adminThe admin search tool allows you to drill down quickly

Select location to change Chicago Early Learning Portal admin

And location detail pages are managed through a simple web form

Change location Chicago Early Learning Portal admin benedict

Conclusion

The process of engaging Chicago residents with this tool has been very rewarding. Since we started this project– and in part based on what we learned here– we started the CUTGroup, a set of regular Chicago residents who get paid to test civic apps. This kind of back-and-forth helps developers, government, and residents communicate with each other and make our lives better.

Civic User Testing Group as a Model in Changing the Relationship Between Government and Residents (#cfasummit)

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Here’s the presentation I’m giving today at the Code for America Summit in the context of the “Changing the Relationship Between Government and Residents” panel. Panel description as follows:

Civic technology often aims to change way governments and citizens interact — but how well is it working and what are we learning from these efforts? This session will focus on how cities are changing the way they relate to residents and enabling new modes of civic participation and engagement.

Looking forward to the conversation with Catherine Bracy, Matthew McNaughton, and Nick Bowden. Here’s my text, slides & links:

Continue reading →

CUTGroup #2: Go2School

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It’s August in Chicago, and the attention of parents and kids turn back to school. There are lots of changes this year in the Chicago Public School system, with school closings & consolidations and safe passage routes  dominating the news and affecting thousands of families.

At Smart Chicago, we don’t play any part in these matters. But since a large part of our mission is to use technology to make lives better in Chicago, we’ve tried to play a small part in making this transition easier. We host and support an app created by local  developer Tom Kompare called  Go2School, a website that allows you to explore travel options to your Chicago Public School. He came up for the idea for this site while when trying to figure out the best way to get his daughter to school – either by public transportation, car, or walking.

CUTGroup #2/ Go2School, Tester #5

We’ve worked with Tom since the Spring to get server space for his creation, and in late May we tested his app with select members of the CUTGroup, a set of regular Chicago residents who get paid to test civic apps. Following is the results of those test.

Segmenting

In Mid-May we sent two emails to all members of the CUTGroup in order to find the most relevant people with whom to review the site. This complete list of CUTGroup members was 368 people, spread across the city. We segmented on two things:

  • Must be responsible for taking one or more child(ren) to a Chicago public school this fall
  • Must be available for testing on either May 28 or May 30

There were 28 people who responded to these requirements. Based on the locations of these people,  we decided to hold tests at two libraries: the Kelly Library in the Englewood neighborhood on Tuesday, May 28th at and at the Uptown Library in the Chicago Uptown neighborhood on Thursday, May 30th. There were 14 people who expressed interested in each location.

Personas

We conducted eight tests with people. We discovered at test time that one of the participants did not have a child in a Chicago Public School (his daughter did, but she couldn’t make it to the test, so he attended for her. We ended up having a great conversation with him, but his results are not included here). Here’s a look at the general neighborhood locations of the testers, showing wide geographic distribution:

Distribution of Testers for CUTGroup002 / Go2School

The testers were spot-on knowledgable about the topic of getting kids to school on time. In an effort to maintain privacy and to provide the widest possible utility of our testing to civic developers everywhere, we developed some shorthand “personas” that helps in identifying their stance vis a vis the app. We took some video/ screencasts of the tests. Here are some helpful cuts of the feedback. If you click to view the files on Vimeo, you can jump directly to the area of interest.

CUTGroup #2, Tester #2 Father responsible for three children (17, 16, and 10) Samsung Galaxy Kelly Library, Englewood

CUTGroup #2, Tester #2 Father responsible for three children (17, 16, and 10) Samsung Galaxy Kelly Library, Englewood from Daniel X. O’Neil on Vimeo.

0:04: Trouble with Next Button: After a valid address was entered. Would not accept a click, then it did.
0:54: Second Search: Executed with no problems
1:40: Mindful of danger: Schools and families talked about preferred routes
2:31: Jazzing it up: Would be helpful

CUTGroup #2, Tester #3 Public wifi searcher with one child and sometimes one additional child at another location

CUTGroup #2, Tester #3 Public wifi searcher with one child and sometimes one additional child at another location from Daniel X. O’Neil on Vimeo.

0:04: No broadband at home: Heavy user of public wi-fi
1:10: Homepage map confusing: Because it has nothing to do with where she lives.
1:47: Thought there would be more information about the school: Very much likes having custom school info on the site.
2:38: Her usual route is simple. But sometimes she takes a friend’s child to a different school via a more complex route
3:44: Tries that route: Notwithstanding my instinct to do it for her.
4:00: Starting over was a bit of a challenge: Back button shenanigans and back-space/ deleting the entire length of the pre-populated school name.
4:46: The other school she’s interested in is not a CPS school: “So this is useless to my now”
5:30: But she tries a workaround: With the “Explore Map” link.
6:19: Then she found a bug: Noble Street Charter School was geocoded incorrectly in the original data.
6:41: Back to the workaround: In finding a route to a Catholic school.
7:17: Issue with the time picker: She wants to enter the time she should leave in order to get there on time, rather than entering the time she needs to arrive (which is how the system is designed).
7:40: Then somehow the back button was invoked. Don’t really know how. She recovers and again enters the time she thinks she should leave to be there by 8AM.
8:12: Did not know she had to pick a day. And did not readily see the error condition. Also: still wants to enter *departure* time rather than arrival.
9:58: And now the error re: arrival time becomes evident. And that was a bummer.
10:48: This was an excellent user test. Very grateful.

CUTGroup #2, Tester #5 Clock-watching, train-watching mother of three Samsung Galaxy Note II Uptown Library

CUTGroup #2, Tester #5 Clock-watching, train-watching mother of three Samsung Galaxy Note II Uptown Library from Daniel X. O’Neil on Vimeo.

0:04: Error Correction: Chose the wrong school from list; used delete button to erase entire school name and go back to the pre-populated list, where her child’s school popped up again
0:33: Pressing the delete button: Many times, quickly, so as to go back to the pre-populated form with school names
1:06: Missed the “what day” choice: User did not select what day they were traveling and could not move forward in the interface upon clicking “Next” . She chooses “time to arrive” just fine…
1:19: But then clicks “next” repeatedly: Not seeing that there is an error condition (did not choose a day for travel)
2:30: User does not want to see route on map: Because she is so familiar with it. She wanted validation of her routes and clarity on exactly what time she’d get there, and that’s that. She’s happy.
3:12: “It will really help all the parents know what time they should leave the house” — What this website does

Upshots

Beyond this super-specific feedback, there were a number of themes worth calling out:

  • People seemed to want to have more school-specific information. For instance, they loved the “call school” option featured on the main directions page. People seemed to expect to get custom info about the school they choose in the lookup tool, and were delighted when it was delivered. Many people called this out as a key differentiator from Google Maps or the like
  • Almost everyone called out the three options— walking, CTA/Metra, or driving— as a positive thing
  • Lots of people had trouble with the “when do you want to arrive” time / date picker screen. We have some good views of this in Tester #2 at 1:06 and Tester #3 at 7:17, 8:12, and 9:58
  • At least two of the parents independently called out safety as a consideration in route planning
  • People seem to really like and use the Chicago Public Schools “Parent Portal” and mentioned it often as a main resource for information

Perhaps the most common of the site’s compliments was the ability to choose which date to leave and which time

All Test Data

Here’s the raw spreadsheet with all of our notes from each of the tests we conducted:

Join us!

Are you interested in joining 500 of your fellow Chicagoans in the CUTGroup? Do it!

[VIDEO] Super-Specific CUTGroup Feedback on Go2School App

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We are preparing our full take on CUTGroup tests we did on Tom Kompare‘s  Go2School, a website that allows you to explore travel options to your Chicago Public School., but I wanted to share some great cuts we took from one of the testers from Tuesday, May 28th at the Kelly Library in the Englewood neighborhood. Take a watch— it’s really worthwhile. If you view the video on Vimeo, you can skip direct to each part.

CUTGroup #2, Tester #3 Public wifi searcher with one child and sometimes one additional child at another location

CUTGroup #2, Tester #3 Public wifi searcher with one child and sometimes one additional child at another location from Daniel X. O’Neil on Vimeo.

0:04: No broadband at home: Heavy user of public wi-fi
1:10: Homepage map confusing: Because it has nothing to do with where she lives.
1:47: Thought there would be more information about the school: Very much likes having custom school info on the site.
2:38: Her usual route is simple. But sometimes she takes a friend’s child to a different school via a more complex route
3:44: Tries that route: Notwithstanding my instinct to do it for her.
4:00: Starting over was a bit of a challenge: Back button shenanigans and back-space/ deleting the entire length of the pre-populated school name.
4:46: The other school she’s interested in is not a CPS school: “So this is useless to my now”
5:30: But she tries a workaround: With the “Explore Map” link.
6:19: Then she found a bug: Noble Street Charter School was geocoded incorrectly in the original data.
6:41: Back to the workaround: In finding a route to a Catholic school.
7:17: Issue with the time picker: She wants to enter the time she should leave in order to get there on time, rather than entering the time she needs to arrive (which is how the system is designed).
7:40: Then somehow the back button was invoked. Don’t really know how. She recovers and again enters the time she thinks she should leave to be there by 8AM.
8:12: Did not know she had to pick a day. And did not readily see the error condition. Also: still wants to enter *departure* time rather than arrival.
9:58: And now the error re: arrival time becomes evident. And that was a bummer.
10:48: This was an excellent user test. Very grateful.

Volunteer at Smart Chicago: Be a CUTGroup Test Proctor

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Chicago Health Atlas Homepage, June 2013 LaunchWe need volunteers to help us with our next few CUTGroup tests. Here’s the commitment:

  • Help us out for 2 hours, 6-8pm, sometime during the week at a public computer center somewhere in Chicago
  • You will be working with CUTGroup testers to review a website about restaurant inspections
  • You’ll be completing some simple forms to gather the tester input and overall results of the UX test

We need testers from all over the city in both English and Spanish.

There is no compensation for being a CUTGroup Test Proctor, but it’s a great opportunity for developers, designers, and UX specialists to get in front of real Chicago residents using honest-to-goodness civic technology.

Interested? Complete this simple form and we’ll take a look.