A new online tally system, devised by staff from IT Sligo, proved to be a big success at last weekend’s Local Election count in Sligo.
Padraig Harte and Edmund Gray, from the Department of Computing and Creative Practice, used Microsoft Cloud Technology which made the tally figures instantly available online to the general public.
The information, which appeared in spreadsheet form, showed the tally of votes for every candidate in every polling booth across county Sligo.
“The feedback we got from the public was fantastic,” said Padraig Harte, a Lecturer in Software Development at IT Sligo. “On Saturday morning, we had more than 1300 hits in the first hour alone – and we had to increase the capacity of the service to cope with the demand.”
Padraig says that over the two days of counting (Saturday & Sunday), there were more than 15,000 downloads of the election count figures and results.
The service was also very popular with media outlets. “Having the data so easily accessible allowed media journalists and commentators the freedom to concentrate on the analysis rather than having to hunt for the figures,” said Edmund Gray of IT Sligo.
It’s now hoped that Cloud Technology will become a regular feature at future election counts in several constituencies.
Staff from IT Sligo working with the online tally service at the Sligo Local Election count in the Clarion Hotel.