August 28, 2009 – (HOSTSEARCH.COM) – Web hosting company
34SP.com has announced the winners of the recent First Ever Pub Mashup Competition which encouraged participants to ''create a mashup that had anything at all to do with pubs''. Mr. Phil Ronan created the winning web-based program which will find the location of Britain's best pubs close to a motor route of the driver's choosing - and even divert them for a quick pint or a bite to eat. The program was created specifically for the Pub Mashup Competition sponsored by UK hosting company 34SP.com, and was the winning entry. The program - which is entitled ''PubStop'' - can even re-route your driving directions and include a stop at the pub with a click of the ''Recalculate route with a stopover at this pub'' button. The pubs included in the stopovers were selected by the guardian.co.uk as Britain's 200 best pubs. As the first prize winner, Mr. Ronan received cash and the use of a virtual server for a year as described here: http://www.34sp.com/vps-hosting.
The winning entry submitted by Mr. Ronan won out over a considerable field of entries including runner's up Keane Ingram and Ollie O'Brien. Their programs were respectively: The Sam Smith's Challenge (''A map showing all of the Sam Smith's pubs in London, all of which we visited as part of a challenge to ourselves'') and a Map of UK Scenicness...and Pubs (New UK scenicness data released by MySociety, with OpenStreetMap's road network and its known pubs).
The contest entry criteria were simply to create a mashup that had anything at all to do with pubs. As defined by Wikipedia, ''mashup'' is a term in web development, denoting a web application that combines data or functionality from two or more sources into a single integrated application. The term mashup implies easy, fast integration, frequently done by access to open APIs and data sources to produce results that were not the original reason for producing the raw source data. Google and Twitter are frequently used by developers when creating mashups as the APIs are well developed and accessible.
The winners of the First Ever Pub Mashup Competition were selected by a panel made up of 34SP.com employees who enjoy going to pubs. The entries were judged on the following criteria: originality, functionality, robustness, betterment of the greater pub community, and being fun and engaging to use.
Stuart Melling, co-founder of 34SP.com described the difficult selection process for the winners, ''Deciding on the actual winner, wasn't an easy decision to make, mainly due to the fact that we'd been in the pub all day, and our vision was a bit blurry. The next day though we tried again. It was still hard though given all the entries we received. In the end we feel that the best pub mashups won.''
About 34SP.com
34SP.com offers professional website hosting services for cost conscious web developers and designers. The 34SP.com team of technical experts offers award winning support and service coupled with a money back guarantee to ensure client satisfaction. Website hosting services offered include: UK dedicated servers and .co.uk domains. The company is headquartered in central Manchester, England.
