Lincolnite

I don’t think it’s blank, I think it’s accurate.  (Ducks, waiting for Neal to come throw something at me)

As of a few few weeks ago (last time I called and checked), the dept. of heath doesn’t have inspection records for food establishments online. I think this falls under Lancaster County’s purview rather than Lincoln, but regardless its still a notable absence.

http://www.journalstar.com/news/local/records/

Yeah, I noticed that online restaurant inspections trail the printed version of the Journal Star, in some cases by several days.

The current online report is weeks old and the paper just ran a new one last week, although I can’t remember what restaurant it was.

In a “past life” I was part of a two man team running the website of a large school district in another state. (48,000+ students).  We did periodic “audits” of other school district and University websites, to see what we weren’t doing that we could/should be. LPS.org was always on our short list of the best public school websites WORLD-WIDE. We often “borrowed” ideas from them for our own site and content.

As things go in this Universe where everything seems random, but nothing is truly a coincidence, I now find myself living in Nebraska and working for LPS. Now and again I get the opportunity to work with the web master here (Brian Fitzgerald.) He is every bit the forward thinking creative genius I expected him to be. He has been (and based upon some hallway conversations we have had will continue to be) a pioneer in the way he appropriately uses new technologies and medias in the site.

What I never expected was that much of the amazing web based application work being done at LPS is completely unseen by the public. It is being done behind the scenes to give useable and meaningful front-ends to the ages old (but rock solid) databases that hold all of the student data and business data for the district’s teachers. It is being done to create modern content management for the district and school web sites. It is being done to present multiple avenues open for teachers to easily create web sites for their classrooms and content. 

In an era where web based access to data is becoming less of a luxury and more of a critical tool, I find myself telling everyone I can get to listen to me how very lucky LPS employees should feel to have the team of people they do working on this sort of thing. It is not all candy and roses, there are bugs and bumps along the way, but on it’s worst day the LPS web presence is a light year ahead of any other school district I have ever seen.

As someone who has been in their shoes in another place and time, I just wanted to share my kudos and appreciation for what they have accomplished, and to where their vision is taking them. I’m glad I am here to get to use it!

The mayor’s blank page is pretty bad.  Hilarious!

<i>The current online report is weeks old and the paper just ran a new one last week, although I can