As I enter the last week of my time working as a Fellow at Appfrica, I wanted to take a few moments to reflect on the experience and to recommend this amazing program to future applicants. My experience has been nothing short of incredible, both on an educational and a networking level. When first reading about the program online, I immediately contacted Jon about joining the company as a Fellow, as I was eager to learn about its for-profit approach and about his experiences as a social entrepreneur in Uganda. Now, after four weeks in the country, I can definitely say that I have learnt a lot and that this experience has helped mould my identity as an aspiring designer for sustainable development and social entrepreneur.

The fellows program is structured in a way to encourage the sharing of skills, knowledge and ideas between members of the Appfrica team and the visiting Fellow. I was able to learn a lot about the technical aspects of mobile application development in resource-poor settings from the fantastic team of programmers here at the office. This was a great opportunity for me, as I get increasingly involved in the information and communication technologies for development (ICT4D) space. I was able to bring my web/graphic design skills to the table and contributed to the design elements of a number of projects that were being developed by the other team members.

In addition to the graphic design work, I was also kept busy coordinating some of the initial technical development for ResultsSMS – my “baby project” during my time here as a Fellow. The first day after I arrived, Jon sat down with me at the excellent Good African Coffee and went through the current projects that Appfrica was working on. We worked together to figure out the best way for me to contribute, learn and to have an overall valuable experience during my time at the company. Due to my growing interest in the application of mobile technologies in international development, I was immediately attracted to the ResultsSMS project, which is an open-source system for distributing medical test results, patient education and follow-up information by SMS in resource-poor settings. As the project was still in its very early stages of conception when I arrived, I spent a lot of my time over the first couple of weeks researching on the technologies that would make such a system implementable, and developing the system together with a geographically dispersed team, through discussions and development of concepts and visualizations. This mini-project management experience and the ability to take control of a whole project during my time here was also incredibly exciting and valuable.

Unfortunately, this control would only be short lived. The Fellows program is of course transient in nature and I guess this would be the only limitation I can think of when reflecting on my experience. Since this project was largely managed remotely, I could have potentially continued to stay involved after the Fellows program. Unfortunately, due to a number of larger commitments I have waiting for me upon my return to Europe, however, this will probably not be possible. Therefore, I recommend that future participants in the program consider structuring their time in such a way to allow for potential completion of a project after physically leaving Uganda.

I also want to take this chance to mention my appreciation for the hospitality of Jon and Sarah, who got engaged during my stay in Uganda! They were wonderful hosts, not only providing me with a very comfortable bed in the guest room of their house 10 minutes from the Appfrica office, but also introducing me to a number of their wonderful friends in Kampala and generally allowing me to be a part of their lives in this very exciting city.

I came here to learn and to absorb everything I could from the experience. I would, therefore, like to end with a number of notes and observations I made throughout my time as an Appfrica Fellow:

For Profit Social Entrepreneurship

Social Entrepreneurship means many different things to many different people. From Creative Capitalism to non-profit business models with socially-oriented missions, the term is becoming almost as synonymous as Web 2.0 or the Cloud. In my opinion, Appfrica’s mission “to indentify individuals with talent, passion and training, picking up where the university leaves off to help them improve their technical skills, while mentoring their growth and solidifying their business skills”, definitely qualifies as social entrepreneurship.

After becoming increasingly interested in this concept over the past couple of years, I was excited to learn how Appfrica Labs balanced is socially-oriented mission with a for-profit model of financial sustainability. I have learnt that this model works incredibly well in the software development/IT space, where a lot of the company’s clients come armed with generous technology-oriented development grants or solid business models and associated financial backing. Appfrica’s clients range from NGOs to African investment groups and start-ups, which creates an interesting mix of projects. Some of these projects have more of a development focus than others, however, they all generally align with the company’s guiding principles of African investment and the building of innovative solutions for developing countries.

Apparent Lack of Design Thinking/Training in Uganda

When mixing in with a lot of the IT crowd in Uganda, and particularly with Makerere University students who are studying in this field, I repeatedly heard comments like “I like coding but I don’t like design” and “I am not much of a creative thinker–I’m not good at design.” It turns out that there is also very little focus on design in the IT-related curricula at local universities, and the general application of design thinking and the design process is also pretty much absent.

Although I think this a real shame, I also think it presents an interesting opportunity for the future. As the Internet starts spreading across the continent and connectivity becomes increasingly feasible and affordable. I think that the need for good web, graphic and UI designers in Africa is going to grow significantly. When this time comes, I imagine that much of Africa’s design work will be outsourced to design studios in the continent’s major economies or abroad. I truly believe that there is a skilled designer in any good coder/programmer. Good code logic and structuring is based on very similar principles to good web-design; I think that there needs to be more focus on developing and fostering these skills in university programs. Therefore, there is an opportunity in trying to create this, support or simply help to develop a solid web-design industry in Uganda. To anyone who is skeptical about the value of good web or UI design in development projects, I ask you to re-consider. The lack of a good interface and streamlined user-experience in a revolutionary technology with a great potential impact, will simply act as an obstacle to its widespread acceptance.

Open Working Environment

Another one of Jon’s founding principles for the company was to create an open working environment for businesses and entrepreneurs to “nest” while they are trying to grow. This makes for a fantastically diverse and exciting work environment, where almost every day, the office will be graced by the presence of an interesting individual who is working on some form of ground-breaking project in Uganda. These “visitors”, who are all allowed to make use of the office’s internet and power supply, quickly become part of the Appfrica “family” and will often share experiences or provide feedback on the current topic of discussion. Jon is further developing this concept into what will be referred to as 10K Spaces as part of Appfrica’s 10,000 Hour Initiative. This is a truly inspiring model for how to run an office of a small start-up.

Doing Well in Africa takes You Very Far

The point I am trying to bring across here is one that I have discussed many-a-time with a number of young entrepreneurs in Kampala. The continent is filled with opportunity and there is almost always a chance to do things better, in whatever industry you happen to be working in. Therefore, getting your hands dirty and investing your time and resources to put your ideas into practice can take you very far, even with little experience. Appfrica’s team members are not 10-year industry professionals, but they also don’t need to be.

Wherever there is a lack of experience, there is determination and competence, which has lead the team to be well-versed (or at least familiar) with an incredibly large number of programming languages, technologies and techniques. Therefore, building a start-up with minimal resources, experience and a team of recent university graduates very much paid off in Apprica’s case.

Providing Basic Resources

The office is theoretically equipped with what is considered one of Uganda’s better internet connections. I say theoretically, as their ISP seems to have a lot of difficulties consistently delivering the speeds it promises. Oh, and the power can drop out without notice as well! I quickly learnt how to work around these limitations, however, and now I create two to-do lists each day splitting my internet tasks and non-internet tasks. This allows me to remain productive even if the power is out. When the Internet does work, it is a vital resource for the company’s operations. Every so often large software development kits or programming guides need to be downloaded, along with the occasional TED video for the day’s source of inspiration. I have learnt that investment into basic resources like good internet and computers, although expensive in this part of the world, really pays off and creates a more productive working environment overall.

No Shortage

Working for a software consultancy with a development focus in Uganda has re-confirmed my original belief that there is no shortage of passion, skill, creativity and unique opportunity in this continent.

Oliver Haas can be reached directly at here.

© 2008 - 2009 Appfrica International. Looking for more African tech? Try our podcast Appfricast which you can also find on iTunes.

A few months ago I formalized this nature of the company as the Appfrica Fellows program. The mission of Appfrica’s Fellows program is to breed an atmosphere of cultural diversity and knowledge sharing. Fellows spend their time in Uganda working along side the staff, earning the equivalent local wage for that job, regardless of their individual skills. It’s a great way to see the world and the challenges others face from a completely different vantage point.

Joushua Goldstein was our inaugural Fellow. Previously an intern at Google, Josh worked on business development for Status.ug, one of our incubated startups. Richard Jeong was the second Fellow working as a graphic designer. David Ellis is currently working with us in various areas of business development. Yesterday we welcomed our fourth, Oliver Haas from the Franklin W. Olin School of Engineering. Oliver will be working with us for six weeks, partially as the lead developer and designer of our HIGH Award winning project ResultsSMS.

We’re always interested in knowledge sharing and building capacity through cultural exchange. To find out more about Appfrica Fellows and how you can apply click here.

Current and Past Fellows

© 2008 - 2009 Appfrica International. Looking for more African tech? Try our podcast Appfricast which you can also find on iTunes.

That said, my new job at Ushahidi saw me go from zero to sixty as soon as I was back on the ground here in Kampala. The nation of Haiti suffered a catastrophic earthquake, killing over 72,000 and displacing hundreds of thousands. If you aren’t aware of Ushahidi, the company makes it’s mission to curate and crowd source reports of incident during crisis events. My job at Ushahidi as the Director of Swift River, is to help to deal with the overwhelming flood of information, commentary and rumor that often follows a tragedy such as this one. Needless to say for the past week it’s all I’ve been willing to make time for. The result was Haiti Tracker, a tool that helps Ushahidi manage the flood of invaluable information coming from Twitter users.

For more on what we’ve been up to at Ushahidi, please visit – http://blog.ushahidi.com/

© 2008 - 2009 Appfrica International. Looking for more African tech? Try our podcast Appfricast which you can also find on iTunes.

Appfrica Labs has been incredibly fortunate over the past ten months. We’ve operated on a shoestring budget, performing what I liked to call ‘alchemy’. That is, creating the applications and services people have come to know us by, without much in the term of internal resources. We’re scrappy and agile and I couldn’t be prouder of our staff for truly making this company what it is today. In two months we’ll be one year old! (This blog is six months older than the incubator.)

As we move in to 2010 we’re already making major changes. To prepare for my work setting up the Ten Thousand Hour Initiative, a year of heavy travel and another mystery project, CTO Ivan Kavuma (pictured above) has been promoted to Managing Director of the company. You may remember Ivan from Appfricast 8 where he and the staff discussed the future and what the IT space looked like from a Ugandan perspective. Ivan has proven himself to be a fantastic mentor and advisor to the staff over the past few months, drawing upon his time in the United States working with companies like Siemens and Microsoft. He’s a ‘natural born coder’ and a true asset to our group.

Due to my increasing involvement with a number of projects (TED, QuestionBox and others included), I will move to the Appfrica Labs Board of Directors, currently held by myself, MBA Glen Mehn and investor Herve Cuviliez. I’ll still manage our relationship with certain clients, legalities, financial aspects and quality control aspects of the company, but Ivan is taking over most day to day operations. He has already overseen the release of Open Question and will now work towards launching our second platform and our first start-up to leave the incubator. Moses Mugisha will take over as lead developer across all products supported by developers Emma Oluka and Jerry Opolot. Barbara Birungi and Frankie Raiderson will handle administrative and sales work, respectively.

To the readers of this blog thanks for your loyalty and continued support. To the clients we’ve worked for this year, thank-you for giving us the benefit of the doubt. To the clients that we let down for whatever reason, thank-you for helping us to mature, in a few months we’ll celebrate our first birthday and all of these experiences and more are shaping our future!

Sincerely,

Jon Gosier

CEO, Appfrica Labs (U) Ltd.

© 2008 - 2009 Appfrica International. Looking for more African tech? Try our podcast Appfricast which you can also find on iTunes.

© 2008 - 2009 Appfrica International. Looking for more African tech? Try our podcast Appfricast which you can also find on iTunes.

Josh Goldstien, blogger, activist, former Googler and Tufts University alumni has joined Appfrica Labs as our very first fellow! When I announced the Appfrica Fellows program earlier this year, I thought it would take some time to convince someone to participate. After all, who wants to come to Uganda to work as a software developer? It turns out, a lot of people do as my inbox was immediately with applications and information requests. Of course, it’s not possible for everyone to participate. There’s a signifgant cost to getting here, as Appfrica can’t afford to pay for transportation to the continent. Still, to know that such support is out there is great!

For those who don’t know about the Appfrica Fellows program, the idea was very much inspired by GeekCORP which I don’t beleive is active any longer. I thought their mission was brilliant, knowledge-sharing opportunities and field experience in developing countries for software developers and other tech people is very rare. Likewise the barriers to entry are high. We offer people the opportunity to gain such experience while making local wages and working alongside Ugandan software developers as peers. Although, I really value volunteerism, I’m idealistic about paying people for their time and I think it’s important for foreigners to experience sort of the capital contraints of working on a local wage.

Although the call was for developers, Josh was one of the people who insisted on being involved regardess. Because I’ve admired his work for a long time (his blog In An African Minute is fantastic) and since he happened to be here in Kampala for the next few months, it only made sense to allow him to participate! His official title while working at Appfrica Labs is Head of Business Development for Status.ug (an Appfrica startup that recently received investment capital). However, being the proactive person that he is, he’s also been working on business development across our various startups including Status.ug and Appfrica Labs itself.

From his personal bio:

I’ve been a fan of Josh ever since he introduced himself to me at Barcamp Africa where he went way out of his way to allow me and David Kobia (of Ushahidi) to have a beer and eat some pancakes with Google’s Andrew McLaughlin. I’m excited to have him on board and everyone at Appfrica Labs is now proud to call him family!

© 2008 - 2009 Appfrica International. Looking for more African tech? Try our podcast Appfricast which you can also find on iTunes.

The team of translators assigned to the AnLoc project (Emmanuel, Denye, James and James Olweny) have finished their work creating a dictionary of English to Luganda software strings and definitions. The project was completed in partnership with AnLoc and Kamusi.org and will lead to more translation projects in the future. We have immediate plans to work on applying these strings very soon.

Staffers Moses Mugisha, Jerry Opolot and Dennis Senyonjo all graduate this month. They’ve all been doing good work and I’m excited to see what the next few months bring for them.

The Question Box pilot we’re doing with Open Mind and Grameen has been extended until August. Thus, part of our office will remain dedicated to the call center set-up specifically for that partnership.

This places the current number of people on staff at ten.

© 2008 - 2009 Appfrica International. Looking for more African tech? Try our podcast Appfricast which you can also find on iTunes.

I’m happy to formally announce my participation in the TED Fellows program this coming July in Oxford, UK. I’ve been a huge fan of TED ever since I saw talks by people like Andrew Mwenda, Jonathan Harris, Jill Bolte Taylor and Jacqueline Novograts. Those people in-particular but also many others that I’ve seen along the way inspired me in many ways to do what I’m doing now. To a stranger, the connection between these four individuals of completely different backgrounds is probably obscure; one a journalist from Uganda, another a researcher and stroke survivor, a web designer barely older than myself and the founder of Acumen. All I can say is that they all affected me in profound ways; Andrews call for accountability from African leaders and Aid organizations, Jonathan’s visual manipulations of large complex datasets, Jacqueline’s insight into the needs of entrepreneurs in developing countries and Jill’s ability to detach, breakdown and analyze her own personal crisis as if she were reading it from a text book. These are all ideas that have shaped me as a person and the way I’ve approached my business, ideas that I definitely think are worth spreading.

For me TED will offer the opportunity to, not only share my own work and experiences, but to learn from others both as peers and mentors. It’s main stages have been graced by people like Malcolm Gladwell, Bill Gates, Stephen Hawking, Amy Tan and other incredibly influential people from various disciplines and industries. It’s intimidating, inspiring and challenging all at once and I’m deeply grateful for the opportunity before me.

The TED Fellows program helps world-changing innovators from around the globe become part of the TED community and, with its help, amplify the impact of their remarkable projects and activities. Fellows are drawn from many disciplines that reflect the diversity of TED’s members: technology, entertainment, design, the sciences, the humanities, the arts, NGOs, business and more.

I’m sure as the weeks go on I’ll share more about my work in preparation for the conference but for now, thanks for the support and wish me and my fellow TEDizens (listed below) luck!

You can see some of my favorite TED Talks for yourself, by visiting my profile at http://www.ted.com/index.php/profiles/view/id/45502

TED Oxford 2009 fellows: Esra’a Al Shafei (Bahrain) – Founder, MiddleEastYouth.com/Blogger; Xavier Alpasa, S.J. (Philippines) – Founder, Rags2Riches/Parish Priest/School Director; Rachel Armstrong, MD (UK) – Teaching Fellow, The Bartlett School of Architecture/Medical Doctor/Science Fiction Author; Nassim Assefi, MD (US/Iran/Turkey/Afghanistan) – Medical Doctor/Writer/Women’s Health Specialist; Frederick Balagadde, PhD (Uganda/USA) – Research Scientist, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory; Michelle Borkin (US) – 3D Visualization Researcher, Harvard University; Constanza Ceruti, PhD (Argentina) – High-Altitude Archeologist/ Anthropologist; Candy Chang (US/Finland) – Design Specialist/Artist; Jessica Colaço (Kenya) – Researcher, SRCC/Mobile Technology Evangelist/Blogger; Shereen El Feki, PhD (Canada/UK/Egypt) – Academic, American University in Cairo/Writer; Gabriella Gómez -Mont (Mexico) – Founder, Tóxico Cultura; Jonathan Gosier (US/Uganda) – Founder, Appfrica; Peter Haas (US/Haiti/Guatemala) – Founder, AIDG/Tinkerer; Meklit Ayele Hadero (Ethiopia/US) – Singer/Musician/Cultural Activist/Resident Artist, Red Poppy House; Marvin Hall (Jamaica) – Founder, Halls of Learning/Teacher; William Kamkwamba (Malawi/South Africa) – Student, African Leadership Academy/ Inventor; V.K. Madhavan (India) – Executive Director, CHIRAG; Evgeny Morozov (Belarus/US) – Blogger/ Political Scientist/ Writer; Naomi Natale (US) – Founder, One Million Bones; Alexander Petroff (US/Democratic Republic of the Congo) – Founder, Working Villages International; Zoya Phan (Burma/UK) – Burmese Human Rights Activist/Author; Seth Raphael (US) – Hi-Tech Magician; Nuhu Ribadu (Nigeria/UK) – Exiled Anti-Corruption Pioneer/Lawyer; Fred Swaniker (Ghana/South Africa) – Founder, African Leadership Academy; Benji Zusman (US)- Co-Founder, CURIOUS/Filmmaker/Scientist

© 2008 - 2009 Appfrica International. Looking for more African tech? Try our podcast Appfricast which you can also find on iTunes.

Administrative Assistant Barbara Birungi has been promoted to be the Project Manager of the pilot Appfrica Labs just launched in partnership with the Grameen Foundation and Open Mind. In addition to managing the internal operations of Appfrica Labs, she will now be the project leader on this project, dubbed AQB (Applab Question Box). New responsibilities include supervising QB operators and acting as the liaison between Grameen’s agricultural experts and Question Box’s team of operators.

The Appfrica Labs Dev team lead by Moses Mugisha have completed a robust offline search engine technology for use in the AQB pilot. The technology uses open source search engines Lucene and Sphinx to search an offline database of information on any given topic. It goes where companies like Google don’t by offering highly accurate search on topics that can be very niche oriented or as broad as the user wants…completely offline. For instance, for the Grameen Agricultural pilot, several hundred hand-picked documents related to their needs were added to the database to make it highly effective at finding information related to Uganda-Agricultural topics. If the information can’t be found offline, it then goes online to search the web. With each search, the database gets smarter as it indexes previous queries.

Developer Dennis Senyonjo is near completion on an incredibly practical mobile application. The mobile device simply sends an SMS to the owner when their power is out and SMSes again when the power is back on. Simple but for anyone who’s lived in sub-Saharan Africa in the past ten years, it’s been a completely absent utility. For small business owners and professionals we think this will be invaluable as it will increase productivity and reduce needless trips too and from the office to see if the power is back. The app has been benchmarked using Nokia emulators and a physical prototype is nearly complete.

Appfrica Labs is facilitating a project for AnLoc (African Localization) and Kamusi to build up a dictionary of English terms translated into Luganda, along with their Luganda definitions. The software provides an API that allows any application developer to use the resulting terminology strings to localize their software.

We’ve also announced our Fellows program which takes the philosophy of Peace Corp and applies it to developers who want to come to Africa. It was very much inspired by the apparently defunct non-profit Geek Corp. Much like those programs, developers have to be motivated enough to come to Kampala with little assistance, but once here we will put them to work at a local wage both as a peer and mentor to our software entrepreneurs. Read more on this.

Developer Apac Manak has left the company for personal reasons, to focus on his final year of school. We wish him the best and encourage him to pursue his aspirations.

© 2008 - 2009 Appfrica International. Looking for more African tech? Try our podcast Appfricast which you can also find on iTunes.

Outside of normal work hours, employees will have 24 hour access to our secure development environment to work on their own ideas and projects. This includes a development server, Linux and Mac computers, whiteboard, office space, and more.

Appfrica Labs is now hiring for the following three full-time positions and one internship…

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JAVA/PYTHON DEVELOPER

As a developer your role is to be a team player, planning ahead and communicating the progress of your assignments while programming. This is a full-time position.

Responsibilities
- Quickly develop Desktop Applications and Software for Deployment using Java
- Critical Thinking and Problem Solving
- Conceptualizing Software Solutions
- Experience with ASP.NET, C++ or C# is a plus

Qualifications and Attributes
- Knowledge of UNIX/Linux or Windows environments
- Fluency in English
- University Degree in Computer Science or at least 2 years of Work Experience
- Strong software development skills, emphasizing detail without sacrificing speed
- Strong interpersonal and communication skills to work with colleagues, stakeholders and donors
- High degree of maturity
- Must be a team player and be comfortable in a multi-cultural environment
- Ambition to excel in your career
- Must have samples of previous work

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PHP/MYSQL DEVELOPER

As a developer your role is to be a team player, planning ahead and communicating the progress of your assignments while programming. This is a full-time position.

Responsibilities
- Quickly develop Web Applications and Software for Deployment using PHP
- Critical Thinking and Problem Solving
- Developing Web Applications Offline using LAMP
- Experience with different Javascript Libraries, PHP Frameworks, Adobe Flash and open source CMS platforms (Drupal, Wordpress etc) is a plus
- The Aptitude to learn new Frameworks and Languages when Necessary
- Quickly develop Web Applications and Software for Deployment using PHP
- Critical Thinking and Problem Solving
- Developing Web Applications Offline using LAMP
- Experience with different Javascript Libraries, PHP Frameworks, Adobe Flash and open source CMS platforms (Drupal, Wordpress etc) is a plus
- The Aptitude to learn new Frameworks and Languages when Necessary

Qualifications and Attributes
- Knowledge of UNIX/Linux or Windows environments
- Fluency in English
- University Degree in Computer Science or at least 2 years of Work Experience
- Understanding of and experience with Version control systems (GITS, SVN, DRAC)
- Strong software development skills, emphasizing detail without sacrificing speed
- Strong interpersonal and communication skills to work with colleagues, stakeholders and donors
- High degree of maturity
- Must be a team player and be comfortable in a multi-cultural environment
- Ambition to excel in your career
- Must have samples of previous work

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MOBILE APPLICATIONS DEVELOPER

As a developer your role is to be a team player, planning ahead and communicating the progress of your assignments while programming. This is a full-time position.

Responsibilities
- Quickly develop Mobile Applications and Software for Deployment using Java or Python
- Critical Thinking and Problem Solving
- Conceptualizing Software Solutions
- Experience with Kannel, Gnokii, OpenROSA, iPhone SDK, Android SDK etc. is a plus

Qualifications and Attributes
- Knowledge of UNIX/Linux or Windows environments
- Fluency in English
- University Degree in Computer Science or at least 2 years of Work Experience
- Strong software development skills, emphasizing detail without sacrificing speed
- Strong interpersonal and communication skills to work with colleagues, stakeholders and donors
- High degree of maturity
- Must be a team player and be comfortable in a multi-cultural environment
- Ambition to excel in your career
- Must have samples of previous work

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INTERN/ASSISTANT

As an Intern, your job is to help handle a number of differing tasks on a daily basis. Some days it will include running papers across town to get signed, other days will consist of answering phone calls with international clients and partners. This position is PART-TIME.

Responsibilities
- Critical Thinking and Problem Solving
- Multi-Tasking, Answering Phones
- Data Entry, Typing

Qualifications and Attributes
- Must currently be enrolled in a University or Trade School
- Solid Typing Skills and Basic Computer Knowledge
- Must have two recommendations from a Teacher or Professor
- Professional Attitude

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All positions are paid. Salaries for each are negotiable based on proven experience. Candidates will have a great advantage if they have experience with any of the following…CMS (Drupal, Wordpress, MovableType), Adobe Air, Visual Basic, .Net, C#, Python and/or frameworks like Django, Ruby and/or frameworks like Rails.

To apply please E-mail copies of your CV to j.gosier@appfrica.org or call +256.773806071

ALL CANDIDATES must currently live in Kampala, Uganda

© 2008 - 2009 Appfrica International. Looking for more African tech? Try our podcast Appfricast which you can also find on iTunes.