#!/usr/bin/perl -w # faq.cgi: # FAQ page for Neighbourhood Fix-It # # Copyright (c) 2006 UK Citizens Online Democracy. All rights reserved. # Email: matthew@mysociety.org. WWW: http://www.mysociety.org # # $Id: faq.cgi,v 1.5 2007-01-23 23:59:08 matthew Exp $ use strict; require 5.8.0; # Horrible boilerplate to set up appropriate library paths. use FindBin; use lib "$FindBin::Bin/../perllib"; use lib "$FindBin::Bin/../../perllib"; use Page; # Main code for index.cgi sub main { my $q = shift; print Page::header($q, 'FAQ'); print faq(); print Page::footer(); } Page::do_fastcgi(\&main); sub faq { my $out = <Frequently Asked Questions
What is Neighbourhood Fix-It for?
Neighbourhood Fix-It is a site to help people report, view, or discuss local problems they've found to their local council by simply locating them on a map.
Can you give me some examples?
Sure. Graffiti, unlit lampposts, abandoned beds, broken glass on a cycle path; anything like that that could be usefully reported to your council to be fixed.
How does it work?
After entering a postcode or location, users are presented with a map of that area. They can view problems already reported in that area, or report ones of their own simply by clicking on the map at the location of the problem.
Is it free?
The site is free to use, yes. Neighbourhood Fix-It is run by a charitable organisation, though, so if you want to make a contribution, please do.
Do you remove silly or illegal content?
We reserve the right to remove any problems or updates which we consider to be inappropriate.

Privacy Questions

Who gets to see my email address?
If you submit a problem, we (do we?) pass on your name, email address, and details of the problem to the council contact responsible for the area where you located the problem. Your name is displayed upon the site, but not your email address; similarly with updates. We will never give or sell your email address to anyone else, unless we are obliged to by law.
Will you send nasty, brutish spam to my email address?
Never. If you opt to when adding a problem or update, you will receive emails about updates to that problem, but that's it.

Organisation Questions

Who built Neighbourhood Fix-It?
This site was built by mySociety. mySociety is a charitable organisation which has grown out of the community of volunteers who built sites like TheyWorkForYou.com. mySociety's primary mission is to build Internet projects which give people simple, tangible benefits in the civic and community aspects of their lives. Our first project was WriteToThem.com, where you can write to any of your elected representatives, for free.
Who pays for it?
Neighbourhood Fix-It for Newham and Lewisham was paid for via the Department for Constitutional Affairs Innovations Fund. mySociety itself has put in some spare resources to cover wider parts of the UK.
Do you need any help with the project?
Yes, we can use help in all sorts of ways, technical or non-technical. Please see our volunteers page.
Where's the "source code" to this site?
The software behind this site is open source, and available to you mainly under the Affero GPL software license. You can download the source code (look under 'bci') and help us develop it. You're welcome to use it in your own projects, although you must also make available the source code to any such projects.
People build things, not organisations. Who actually built it?
OK, we are Francis Irving, Chris Lightfoot, Richard Pope, Matthew Somerville, and Tom Steinberg. Thanks also to Ordnance Survey (for the maps and UK postcodes), the entire free software community (FreeBSD, Linux, PHP, Perl, Python, Apache, MySQL, PostgreSQL, we love and use you all!) and Easynet (who kindly host all our servers). Let us know if we've missed anyone.
EOF return $out; }