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Thursday, May 15, 2014 X Volume 27 No. 56
THURSDAY
Communist Party of Canada leader speaks tonight in city Page A6
THIS WEEK Thompson Rivers University students Tim Tung (left) and Sultan Wehaibi command a drone from an app they designed. Dave Eagles/KTW
Kamloops Venom look to take bite out of the Kelowna Raiders Page A31 Thompson River Publications Limited Partnership
Council has appetite for food trucks By Andrea Klassen STAFF REPORTER
andrea@kamloopsthisweek.com
real app-titude By Dale Bass
STAFF REPORTER
dale@kamloopsthisweek.com
W
HILE FACULTY SPEND plenty of time in the lab or classroom doing research, Thompson Rivers University encourages graduate and undergraduate students to also get involved in that aspect of education. In one of Musfiq Rahman’s computerscience classes, that focus led to creating applications to be used on smartphones and tablets, projects the students were required to present at the end of the term — whether they were successful or not. For example, Rob Carrelli talked to the class of 14 students about the game he created, one he called Detectives versus Fugitives, a project he envisioned as a multiplayer game that would involve Google
maps and other online tools. The premise is clear in the name: Pick a detective avatar, get assigned a fugitive who would take off — his presentation involved a Google map of TRU — and leave clues that could be accessed to help in the chase. Next up on the day KTW visited was Fan Jim, who created a Pikachu pedometer, one that would see the chubby Japanese Pokemon character run when the device was shaken. He created it so the user could interact and talk to the little character. Morris Regalo told the students his project required him to shift gears as he worked on the animation involved on the planet project he was creating, a result of sensitive settings, while Andrezy Oraniewicz showed the graphing calculator and formula creator he developed for use on a tablet, one that could do a long stream of operations.
Alex Buckley had to wing it on the day of his presentation as a widespread power outage that affected his home left him with all the work on his computer and no way to access it. He talked about how his original plans to create a multi-player game didn’t work out, adding he had learned a lot more than he expected about things like three-dimensional images. Mohammed Alamri took a basic issue at TRU — finding a parking spot and remembering where you left the car — as the inspiration for the application he created to find that parked car. The in-class presentations complete, the group moved outdoors for the final presentation, one that involved wi-fi technology, a drone and a smartphone.
The city’s food trucks will have more places to park after Kamloops city council this week passed a package of zoning and licensing changes that will allow trucks in the downtown and other areas previously deemed off-limits. In addition, as part of a pilot program, trucks will have the option of renting space on private downtown properties, as long as they are at least 50 metres from an established restaurant. Council adopted the changes following a public hearing on Tuesday, May 13. While Gay Pooler, general manager of the Kamloops Central Business Improvement Association, told council most of her membership, including restaurateurs, support bringing in food trucks, there was some pushback at the hearing from one traditional bricks-and-mortar business. Senor Froggy owner Robert Stodola objected to the city’s plans to allow trucks to park in front of the Thompson-Nicola Regional District building (which also houses the public library) at Fifth Avenue and Victoria Street. “We’re talking about putting them right outside virtually the only public washroom in the downtown core,” Stodola said. “Nobody subsidized my washrooms.” Stodola said he likes the idea of putting food trucks in underserved areas of the city, like Riverside Park, and didn’t object to the other proposed downtown location — at Second Avenue and Seymour Street by Gaglardi Square. But, he thinks the Fifth and Victoria area already has enough restaurants. “We’re talking about putting it in an area that has 29 restaurants within a five-minute walk of where we’re talking about,” Stodola said. Joe Thompson, co-owner of the food truck Cat and Joe’s Pig Rig, said he understands why traditional restaurants could feel threatened by food trucks, but argued both dining venues have their competitive advantages.
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