The T Talk @ Tumo using Prezi

On Friday 8^th April 2011 at the FriTumo session, the IT Team gave a short presentation to the rest of the Tumo teams. The idea was to give a brief outline of what the IT team does at Tumo in approximately 10 minutes. Originally I had hoped to have something like an inspirational Ted Talk, but with preparation time lacking it turned out to be a much simpler ‘Introduction to IT’ for the others. 

I took this chance to try a new presentation creation tool I had seen back at the ArmNet 2010 Awards, called Prezi (found freely available at prezi.com). It allows for zooming and highly interactive interlinked presentations. The learning curve was very small and I managed to get the whole presentation put together within an hour.

Tumo T Talk on Prezi

My biggest complaint with Prezi was adjusting the text size of different parts, I have a habit of zooming in and out with the scroll wheel on the mouse and every time I did the text size would change for a new text object. In defence of Prezi developers, they have done this text sizing intentionally to organise the hierarchy titles, sub titles, body text etc.

Still with a few prepared graphics and well thought out flow, I see Prezi beating MS Powerpoint as a general presentation tool. The free account allows 100 Mb of uploads which is fine as long as you prepare the images in advance. I very much intend to use the online based software again although It’s going to require a bit of a fresh uptake to move away from the structured slide format which has been ingrained into me over the years by Powerpoint. Overall the audience enjoyed the brief presentation and liked the swirly animation that Prezi does so well (naturally the Turkish delight also helped).

And so it begins... Introductory First Post

I do not have a long career to step through or decades of experiences to share, but like any good story a little background information about the inspiration for this blog can’t hurt...

I was a student at King's College London (KCL) from 2004 until end-2009. During that time I studied a surprisingly vast array of topics taught by, or linked with, the Division of Engineering. Initially I completed three year BEng (Bachelor of Engineering) course in Computer Aided Mechanical Engineering, which gave me the fundamentals to feel more comfortable in the academic environment. From this I pursued graduate study in a rare mix of different departments in which I was well known for advocating the engineer's mindset. Highlights for me included Advanced Topics in Nanotechnology, Rapid Prototyping, Digital Culture and Technology (Centre for Computing in the Humanities), Science of Security (War Studies Department), Geographical Information Systems (Geography Department). 

During my final MSc (Master in Science) year at King's College London, I entered the Lion's Den business plan competition in which we were required to build a team (maybe i’ll cover this more in a later post). I quickly recruited Alessandro Mambelli from our shared Agents and Multi Agent Systems course (Computer Science Department) as a person who stood out and asked interesting questions, we competed very successfully up until the last round with our imaginary company Lionsharp Technologies. The company proposed to develop a innovative new piece of Educational Technology named Florb Sphere to be used in schools around the world.

After so many years in London, I fancied a change of scenery and pursued volunteerism. Being of Armenian descent I looked towards the edge of Europe and Asia. I was recruited by AVC (Armenian Volunteer Corps) where I agreed to three months of volunteering in Yerevan, Republic of Armenia. Sitting waiting for volcanic ash to clear the skies before I could fly, I pondered over the information I had on the position. All I knew was that I would be working in a technical role within a teenagers’ educational centre.

Quickly after arriving I realised I had wholly underestimated the project. I was welcomed from day one into the Tumo Project as the Software Development Team's Project Manager. Our team of five were working on an Adobe Flash-based virtual learning environment where users can interact, chat and learn together. The biggest challenge by far was the language barrier, second to which the different work ethics sometimes made the whole day an uphill struggle. During these three volunteer months I became more and more involved in other parts of the Tumo Project.

The TUMO Project

The Tumo Project is an initiative to innovate education in the developing world. Here we are building the world's first Tumo Center (shown above), which also happens to be the world's biggest Creative Technologies Centre. The centre aims  (when fully open) to provide 1000 computers spread over two floors in a very large studio like space, a full 3D cinema, a library, lecture halls, a music studio, dozens of creative labs and the city's largest child friendly green park outside. Our focus is to introduce youths between the ages of 12-18 to four key focus areas; Computer Animation, Digital Media, Web Design and Game Design, whilst we also develop their skills in things such as drawing, music, English language, programming, creative writing etc. In an ex-soviet country like Armenia, these opportunities are simply not available elsewhere and it is the youth who are deprived the most. The entire project is non-profit and I have settled for a salary far less than friends back in the UK, simply because I get to have such an influential role in a dream project.

Architect's visualisation of Tumo Center south side

The added personal perspective which you gain when living and working abroad cannot be underestimated, some of the simplest and most obvious things present challenges that you would never foresee especially when building on such a scale.

I have stayed on for almost a year now, and I expect that I'll be here for at least one more. In that time I have managed to progress to being the Centre's technical systems director and IT project manager, a big role which often challenges my lack of experience. I interface with five different teams daily whilst managing my own IT team in which we have been charged to design and install the network, server and user computer systems. We are working with the latest technologies imported direct from USA and UK (which is not without its paperwork/logistic challenges).

 In December 2010, I managed to convince Alessandro to fly out here and he has committed one year to the IT Team. In these few short months we have completed Phase 1 and 2, which included installing the fastest building network in the country with a 10 Gigabit Fibre Optic backbone, a unified wireless network system, a full building VoIP system (using the Epygi Quadro) and virtualising almost 12 servers. The first hundred Apple iMacs are sitting in a container ready to depart the UK at the time of writing this and really it’s all go go go at the moment.

I am now engaged to be married, taking life as fast as it comes and genuinely enjoying the experience of being somewhere I can make a difference. We hope to open Tumo during August 2011. So in the meanwhile I have decided to start this online blog outlining the variety of challenges I deal with weekly just as a matter of interest and something for me to reminisce over in the future.

I can hardly comprehend where I am now, never mind think about where to go next. I know I need to stay and be here for the grand opening and help the systems settle down. Alessandro is passionate about setting up one of the creative labs as a small robotics studio. I on the other hand see the potential for expansion internationally, building small Tumo Labs linked back via a VPN (Virtual Private Network) to the central hub here in Yerevan.

I wholeheartedly recommend watching this short five minute video outlining the Tumo Project, which can also be found on http://www.tumo.org/

from Tumo Admin on Vimeo.

Please feel free to contact me,

Nigel Sharp

Lionsharp Tech Journal Author

KCLEA Honorary Editor

Technical and IT Systems Director - Tumo Project, Yerevan