Site Changes

Just to share what we are doing on the site we are sharing a change log of all the ‘major’ changes to the site. Initially we will put in only a few key dates as there were many minor changes. Going forward, I will add more minor details.

19 March 2006Moved polls, events and directory to mod_rewrite URLS that are cleaner and more logical. Also added embeded google maps to single directory listing pages… however, I have to fetch a google map to get the lat/long first, so might prove to be too slow.
14 March 2006Changed the homepage to show 2 full stories and 12 except versions of stories to allow 6 more stories on the homepage.
2 February 2006Added a larger footer to un-clutter the homepage more and add important links to the rest of the sites pages. Also created a main archive page
5 December 2005Added javascript to show/hide list of hot items… the list had grown too long. Hopefully it “degrades” nicely as its based on Jeremy Keith’s DOMScripting ideas.
1 December 2005Added three month Tesco Bay Obervation pages. Its the first use of MySQL and PHP on the site. Seems to work fine… I might need to convert the Events and Directory to this…
17 November 2005Created new action in poll.cgi to allow for direct 150×150 viewing of the current poll results, created an include version of gd_pie to do this
16 November 2005Added flag to allow inactive polls to appear in polls list, just without the option to vote
21 October 2005Converted homepage to shtml so no more publishing events each morning, it updates itself…. since I was doing that, I moved to a new weather widget that I wrote using METAR data, moved to background image for bullet chevron, so IE users can see it too and (finally) added the ‘Hot Items’ section to keep important topics on the homepage
11 October 2005Converted homepage events lists to new hCalendar format just in case this becomes popular… or even useful.
27 September 2005Added a print style sheet that makes links visible and gets rid of unnecessary information (e.g. navigation, footer, etc…)
21 September 2005Lowered the limit again on polls to 2 per IP and added javascript warning to that affect.
18 September 2005Made the site 80 pixels wider to give more breathing room
15 September 2005Fixed the Train Parser to work with new format of data
15 September 2005Added a check to make sure people cannot abuse the polls as easily
4 July 2005Added images to the event application. Also, retaining expired events incase anyone bookmarks them.
29 June 2005To the event application, added ‘kids’ as a flag for events, so it can be any type AND kids. Also added ‘host’ entity so that groups can host an event at another venue and it will show up for both directory listings
22 June 2005Added ‘global’ footer to Train Times and back to Newsletter applications
15 June 2005Moved Local Websites to right column and added Upcoming Plays section
15 June 2005Added all known Richmond Theatre and Orange Heather Plays
4 June 2005Linked Events into Local Info/Directory application so you can see events if you are looking at a single Venue
24 May 2005Published First Newsletter
17 May 2005Local Info/Directory application initially completed
12 May 2005Events application initially completed
10 May 2005Poll application initially completed
8 May 2005Added footer to the site
5 May 2005Newsletter sign up application initially completed
22 April 2005Beta Launch
27 March 2005Alpha Launch
25 March 2005Purchased the stmgrts.org.uk domain
22 March 2005Train time application initially completed
21 March 2005Initial Site Set-up with Movable Type and YABB forums