Miss E .D .C http://blog.ethelcofie.com Thoughts on Software development,IT Business Consultancy,New Technologies and other random stuff i have done Mon, 23 May 2011 14:29:42 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.1.2 Motech Mobile Midwife -an Mhealth Project http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2010/11/22/motech-mobile-midwife-an-mhealth-project/ http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2010/11/22/motech-mobile-midwife-an-mhealth-project/#comments Mon, 22 Nov 2010 14:45:45 +0000 ethelcofie http://blog.ethelcofie.com/?p=233 This past year i worked as a Technology Analyst on Mobile Technology for Community Health MoTeCH : suite of services delivered over basic mobile phones that provides relevant health information to pregnant women and encourages them to seek antenatal care from local facilities.
Here’s a video of how Motech works

]]> http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2010/11/22/motech-mobile-midwife-an-mhealth-project/feed/ 0 My Beef with Cinderella , yep i am talking about the fairytale http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2010/11/10/my-beef-with-cinderella-yep-i-am-talking-about-the-fairytale/ http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2010/11/10/my-beef-with-cinderella-yep-i-am-talking-about-the-fairytale/#comments Wed, 10 Nov 2010 17:24:23 +0000 ethelcofie http://blog.ethelcofie.com/?p=222

image from likecinema.net

We all know the story Cinderella lives with her wicked step mother and step sisters after her father dies , she is mistreated , one day a fairy god mother helps her to go to the prince’s ball she meets the prince , they fall in love , he finds her again using her glass slipper(so what!! was she the only one with that shoe size in the whole town ?) and they live happily ever after .





Now my Beef with this story
1.Cinderella was a wimp
Cinderella did stand up for herself so day in day out slaving away not complaining , wasting her life away as a maid .. and she wasn’t even getting paid . I would have given her more respect if she had run away from home and went to work for someone as a maid(at least she had the experience).This chic should have taken her life in her own hands ..
Who want a queen that cant take charge of her own life , how is she going to be a worthy partner to the prince when he becomes King ?!!!

2.What if the prince had not fallen in love with her
That was a distinct possibility after all there were many girls in the palace on that day: then she would have still remained a maid .

3.Chic didn’t even know the prince very well
how the hell do u decide to marry someone whom you just met and danced with ,no you don’t marry someone after one date do you ?
He is also quite shallow himself marrying a girl just cause she is pretty .. Dude!! didn’t they teach you anything in prince school?

4. This story gives step mothers a bad wrap , come on there some nice one’s out there .

Only part of this story i like is that she chose to forgive her step mother and sister after all that happened ;)

So i ask what did we mean to teach young girls with this story ? i know i show my version of crazy with this blog post but that’s why you all love me :)

]]> http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2010/11/10/my-beef-with-cinderella-yep-i-am-talking-about-the-fairytale/feed/ 4 STD , Mobile Phones and Africa http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2010/11/09/std-mobile-phones-and-africa/ http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2010/11/09/std-mobile-phones-and-africa/#comments Tue, 09 Nov 2010 18:47:10 +0000 ethelcofie http://blog.ethelcofie.com/?p=210 One of the projects I worked on this past year was the Mobile Technology for Community Health MoTeCH : suite of services delivered over basic mobile phones that provides relevant health information to pregnant women and encourages them to seek antenatal care from local facilities.

So i am always interested when i find data on use of the mobile phone in relation to health .
… So I have just being reading on the Mobile phone kits to diagnose STDs in the UKwhere People who suspect they have been infected will be able to put urine or saliva on to a computer chip about the size of a USB chip, plug it into their phone or computer and receive a diagnosis within minutes, telling them which, if any, sexually transmitted infection (STI) they have.

mobilehealth

image from computer weekly

I thought about how in Ghana West Africa could possibly borrow the concept but adapt it to our environment .
-The kits are probably to expensive for the average person to buy so we could use sms/text and it might possibly work this way :
1.we build a knowledge base of Q&A in the backend and then user can text initially to start the process
2.Then the user will be sent an SMS questions and they can answer yes or no
3.Based on their answers to those questions further questions be asked .
4.A provisional diagnosis be given to the user at the end of QA session and then they can be directed to nearest health post .
Achieves the same purpose: it gets people to health centers to seek medical care .



Anyone doing this in the African/west African region ?

]]> http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2010/11/09/std-mobile-phones-and-africa/feed/ 1 Three great virtues of a programmer: laziness, impatience, and hubris http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2010/11/02/three-great-virtues-of-a-programmer-laziness-impatience-and-hubris/ http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2010/11/02/three-great-virtues-of-a-programmer-laziness-impatience-and-hubris/#comments Tue, 02 Nov 2010 22:16:49 +0000 ethelcofie http://blog.ethelcofie.com/?p=204

“We will encourage you to develop the three great virtues of a programmer: laziness, impatience, and hubris.” — LarryWall, ProgrammingPerl (1st edition), OreillyAndAssociates

Laziness
The quality that makes you go to great effort to reduce overall energy expenditure. It makes you write labor-saving programs that other people will find useful, and document what you wrote so you don’t have to answer so many questions about it. Hence, the first great virtue of a programmer.

Impatience
The anger you feel when the computer is being lazy. This makes you write programs that don’t just react to your needs, but actually anticipate them. Or at least pretend to. Hence, the second great virtue of a programmer.

Hubris
Excessive prider. Also the quality that makes you write (and maintain) programs that other people won’t want to say bad things about. Hence, the third great virtue of a programmer.

culled from

http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?LazinessImpatienceHubris

]]> http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2010/11/02/three-great-virtues-of-a-programmer-laziness-impatience-and-hubris/feed/ 1 Find of the week – Paper.li (Twitter) http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2010/10/28/find-of-the-week-paper-li/ http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2010/10/28/find-of-the-week-paper-li/#comments Thu, 28 Oct 2010 11:48:06 +0000 ethelcofie http://blog.ethelcofie.com/?p=189 I just came across Paper.li , is this an awesome idea or what !!

Basically paper.li organizes links shared on Twitter into an easy to read newspaper-style format. Newspapers can be created for any Twitter user, list or #tag.

A great way to stay on top of all that is shared by the people you follow – even if you are not connected 24/7

So A user can basically begin to publish in newspaper format
1.All their twitter links or
2.The twitter links of people on their twitter list or
3.All twitter links from a hash tag

Benefits
1.if you host events like i do you can basically create a giant newspaper of all thoughts and links from events
2.if you use twitter hash tags for discussions amongst users .. can u see the advantages of capturing all the that info in one place

and it alleviates the guilt of not blogging as much because you are always tweeting(well at least for me ) because all my link are in one place and i can put the link on my !!bingo

My favorite paper.li newspaper at the moment is The most influential people in tech Daily

Now they need to allow that newspaper to be converted to PDF…..*cough cough* feature request :)

]]> http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2010/10/28/find-of-the-week-paper-li/feed/ 0 Joke : User Requirement http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2010/10/25/joke-user-requirement/ http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2010/10/25/joke-user-requirement/#comments Mon, 25 Oct 2010 14:01:41 +0000 ethelcofie http://blog.ethelcofie.com/?p=178 For All Business Analyst the st and Developers who relate with the difficulties in getting that user requirements document locked down (Just for laughs)

User Requirements image from the Modern Analyst website

]]> http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2010/10/25/joke-user-requirement/feed/ 0 Ghana : Data protection , Population census and Lunch http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2010/10/18/ghana-data-protection-population-census-and-lunch/ http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2010/10/18/ghana-data-protection-population-census-and-lunch/#comments Mon, 18 Oct 2010 13:51:41 +0000 ethelcofie http://blog.ethelcofie.com/?p=168 I was at a clients on Friday evening whilst the Ghana Census staff came in to gather their data
I noted that the census staff asked a lot more questions than i thought necessary
E.g
How many people owned mobile phone’s in the house(i suppose this is for mobile penetration numbers)
What type of roofing agent was used for the house etc

Anyways i digress this brought on a discussion about data protection laws in Ghana and if any existed .I had no conclusive information so i deferred the discussion for another time ….

Fast Forward >> to Monday Morning
Question was still on my mind so I inquired of my facebook friends

Quick question does ghana have data protection laws in Ghana ? , i ask because i wonder how census data is going to be protected

… generating quite an interesting discussion on if data protection laws were important in the African context anyways i decided to actually find information on the subject.

After some digging (well googling actually) ..apparently the government(ministry of communication) is in consultation with stakeholders on Data protection [big smile on my face]

Accra, Aug 24, GNA – Government on Tuesday initiated stakeholder consultation for the passage of Data Protection Bill (DPB) and Electronic Communications Regulations Bill (ECRB) to serve as legal instruments for the safeguarding of personal data and privacy.

The Bill provides for the protection of privacy through the regulation of information processing relating to individuals including the method by which data is obtained, held, used or disclosed.

The stakeholder consultation which was to create a platform for operators to fine-tune the bill and make it relevant to Ghana’s environment, was attended by representatives from the Judiciary, security agencies, telecom operators, media practitioners, representatives from the National Communication Authority and financial institutions

So know we just need this consultation process to be completed quickly and a bill before parliament , that would bring a bigger smile to my face

ok now its time for lunch , catch you later

]]> http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2010/10/18/ghana-data-protection-population-census-and-lunch/feed/ 5 Consultancy Series : Open Source Software for Business-Mifos http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2010/10/15/consultancy-series-open-source-software-for-business-mifos/ http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2010/10/15/consultancy-series-open-source-software-for-business-mifos/#comments Fri, 15 Oct 2010 12:46:38 +0000 ethelcofie http://blog.ethelcofie.com/?p=161 Series on Open Source Software for Business

Micro Finance Institutions

I have being working on encouraging many organizations to consider open source alternatives to a lot of the commercial products that are around at the moment.

Advantages of Open source vs. Commercial Product

-It’s simple: open source means that there are developers all over the world working to make this product better as opposed to commercial products who are worked on by relatively small team and all additional software features or update are based on their commercial viability

-Lastly it’s a far cheaper option; you don’t pay for the product itself you pay for the Implementation and customization only

Today I want to talk about Mifos and how rural banks and many micro finance institutions can this free open source software to administer and run their institutions .

Mifos is a management information system (MIS) featuring a user-friendly, web interface running on top of a robust MySQL database. Flexible to meet your unique operational needs and scalable for rapid growth, Mifos enables real-time access to data across your organization from any web browser.

Features include:

• client management,

• loan and savings portfolio management,

• transaction processing,

• Social and business reporting and analytics.

Advantage

Efficiency & Ease of Use- Speed up your client acquisition cycle, increase loan officer productivity, and manage your portfolio securely and effectively.

Growth & Scalability– Mifos is a centralized web-enabled solution built on top of a MySQL database. Its built-in scalability means you can rapidly open new branches and roll out new products and services; all supported by a modern architecture with the robust capacity to support up to 1 million clients.

Transparency & Insight– Through real-time access to your data and a powerful reporting engine, use effective business analytics and transparency to guide your strategy and satisfy external reporting requirements.

Security & Data Integrity– Client data is secure from corruption and fraud through in-depth audit trails tracking all changes, coupled with a granular role-based permission system.

Flexibility & Agility– Proactively respond to competition and changing client needs by rapidly creating new services through on-the-fly product definition.

Innovation & Evolution– Broaden your outreach and accelerate innovation by incorporating new front-end technologies and integrating with other systems and networks on top of Mifos’ common platform.

Intimacy & Outreach– Client management tools like surveys help you collect market knowledge and deliver value-added services. Let your field staff focus more on customers’ needs and less on data entry.

If you work for a Micro-finance institution and are interested in Mifos deployment … what are the next steps …

-Firstly you need to document your processes as a microfinance institution , e.g. what are the steps in loan processing , what are documents produced and who are the officers involved in this process .This can be done by management and in-house IT team or hire a professional Business analyst to facilitate the process

-Secondly you need to investigate Mifos and see if it aligns with your business needs, If you find that it mostly aligns and that little changes need to be made (i.e. not more that 50 % percent of the core Mifos system needs to be customized) then I recommend you talk a technical person like me who can work on customization and implementation. E.g. If in addition to having the system working in your offices you want your loan officers to able to register new customers and collects loan payments via their mobile phone

If a lot more than 50 % of features need to be customized it’s better to look at other micro-finance MIS solutions available

-Thirdly Implement the Solution: that means if you don’t already have computers you need to purchase a couple, if you don’t already have your computers networked have them networked so that Technical team can implement the system on your premises

]]> http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2010/10/15/consultancy-series-open-source-software-for-business-mifos/feed/ 2 Changes to come in the New Year http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2009/12/21/changes-to-come-in-the-new-year/ http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2009/12/21/changes-to-come-in-the-new-year/#comments Tue, 22 Dec 2009 01:57:38 +0000 ethelcofie http://blog.ethelcofie.com/?p=156

All changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy; for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves; we must die to one life before we can enter another. ~Anatole France.

This quote encapsulates all the wonderful changes that will be happening in my personal and professional life in the New Year.
Stay Tuned

]]> http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2009/12/21/changes-to-come-in-the-new-year/feed/ 0 Volunteer Skills maybe we can help http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2009/12/03/volunteer-skills-maybe-we-can-help/ http://blog.ethelcofie.com/2009/12/03/volunteer-skills-maybe-we-can-help/#comments Thu, 03 Dec 2009 21:13:15 +0000 ethelcofie http://blog.ethelcofie.com/?p=141 So once in a while i come across a website i really think needs improvement and i usually talk ,blog or rant about the issues it has .

My intention in all this is not to show that the developers didnt do a good job , I am just saying there is a lot of room for improvement .

There are a number sites on my radar at the moment

Instead of writting a blog post everytime i see websites that are not what they should be , I propose we do something about it .

The Plan:I am seeking web developers,designers and usability consultants who will give thier skills pro bono(free) to consult on and even help in house teams to improve or even rebuild these websites .

My plea to the organisations :If you work for any of these organisations whose website is mentioned above please contact me at ethel@ethelcofie.com to see how we can help improve your website .

Also if you are a web developer,designer or usability consultant and wish to donate your skills to improve these website .please contact me at ethel@ethelcofie.com.

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