Restoration and Rejuvination

Over in Australia, the Ashes have begun, which means I’m up a bit later than usual. You only need ears to listen to Test Match Special so I have some spare brain- and finger-power to update this blog and the main website.

For my first trick, the majority of the site’s old content has now been restored – although it still needs some tweaking to make sure it all appears as intended, which is why you won’t see any difference on the main homepage. The links will be restored as soon as possible.

However, the big news is a(nother) complete overhaul of the site. While the appearance will hopefully stay more or less the same, the plan is to move the whole site to a Content Management System (CMS), which has several benefits. These include:

• Easier and quicker to update (in theory)
• Less likely for content to be out of date due to a central database structure (especially relevant for things like bus routes)
• Should be easier to put future upgrades in place.

Testing on the new CMS is still at the initial stages, so you won’t notice any changes overnight, but hopefully in the long term the site will be better for both me as author and you as readers.

The site that once was broken…

shall be remade. OK, so I badly adapted a bit of Tolkien.

This little thing called a job turned up late last winter, and that put paid to any major maintenance on the site. That doesn’t sound like a disaster – until the server I kept the whole site on apparently fell off the internet. Net result (no pun intended) is IWpaths.co.uk dies just in time for the summer of 2010. Well, having found time and new server space, it’s back.

For the moment, the site is just a holding page, based on the familiar home page of old. However, as the next few days (possibly weeks) go by, old pages will return – and there’s a rather more fundamental change coming too. More on that story in the next post.

I must have overslept…

…because there’s been nothing doing here for far too long. Already it’s nearly Advent, the buses change again in under a month, and no additions to the blog! The main site hasn’t fared any better either – it got new content in the early hours of this morning – after a 3 month wait. This really is appalling, and while I could bore you with the reasons, let’s just say something should have appeared by now!

I won’t carry on like this, or I’ll just get annoyed with myself, which won’t help anyone. What I will do is promise that the South side of the Coast Path will be complete from Ryde to Alum Bay by the end of the month. That’s the least I feel I can do after such a long break.

Oh yes, and another transport map is on its way. If you don’t already know, direct buses from Bembridge, Brading and Freshwater to Newport are all going, with other services re-routed to [partially] compensate. Just don’t plan on taking a bus across Brading Down next summer.

The Busman cometh…

Well, it’s already August, and at the end of the month all the bus timetables on the Isle of Wight are republished. There are enough changes this time for a brand-new map of the routes from September.

Even more exciting though, the local bus company, Southern Vectis, have started to use Twitter for live running updates… and you can now find these on the Bus information page along with details of the new routes.

Don’t worry, I haven’t forgotten about the main purpose of the site – but there have been several other things pressing on me recently, so apologies if you were expecting the next update to be about the Coast Path or the Yar Trail – they are coming, honest!

The Coast Path returns

…but in an understated way. If you have a look now you will see the brand new page for the route as a whole. There’s also a new-look edition of the Ryde to Bembridge section of the route.

The rest of the route will be dealt with shortly. Also on my list of things to do for the site…

• Write up the rest of the Yar Trail
• Finish the last few cycle routes
• Complete the Summits on the Air section

So there’s plenty still to do. I hope you enjoy it!

Coastal Wanderings

The Coast Path is coming…

The Coast Path, as remarked last week, is still not on the site. But it is coming, with brand-new maps and a switch to the new clearer page style. I hope the whole section will be available from Monday (fingers crossed).

PS: If you’re still waiting for the Yar Trail to be finished, this is next on the list…

In the pipeline…

Well folks, I’m sorry there’s been a complete wall of silence since the site went live again – I’ve been exceptionally busy over the last fortnight.

Unfortunately, this lack of time means I have not been able to fix the single biggest problem with the site – the main page for the Coast Path. As you may have noticed, the Coast Path’s page doesn’t currently exist. I had lots of shiny plans (in my head) for improving this section of the site, but they have not yet come to be, mainly as I couldn’t delay the site’s relaunch any further. I will be putting my typing fingers to good use by upgrading this soon.

Depending on how long it takes to re-write the Coast Path’s main page, the old rubbish-looking version might have to make an appearance again in the meantime. I hope it doesn’t come to that, but I don’t feel it’s right for the site to continue much longer with nothing about the route that actually kick-started it in the first place!

About 24 hours later than planned…

the main website is now back. If you still get sent to this blog after entering www.iwpaths.co.uk, then try this direct link, or purge your computer’s cache.

Be warned: part of the reason the re-launch was delayed is that it wasn’t completely ready. In fact, there are still some areas that aren’t done, so apologies in advance if what you’re looking for still isn’t online. I will try to sort this in the next couple of weeks.

Two days…

Well, there’s only two days to go until my self-imposed deadline, and I’m increasingly convinced that I won’t get the whole site restored in time. The main pages will be there, although I’m a bit worried about the Coast Path. However, some of the more detailed pages might not be fully ready, so if on Saturday you discover a page where lots of images aren’t showing up, please accept my apologies.

That said, work on the site continues apace. The section for walking routes is virtually done, cycle routes are getting there and the site information pages (such as sitemap, updates etc) are completely ready.

The travel section has been completely revamped, with links to new bus and train timetables, and a brand new look.

Anyway, time to stop talking about it, and get back to doing it…

Brighstone Down from the Longstone, north of Mottistone

Testing is a matter of:

Making sure all the pages are actually online and available

Checking all the pages have photos instead of annoying ‘X’ symbols

Making the site look as good as possible in a short time.

Trying not to go mad

Of course, it is very important to make sure that what you do eventually get to see is worth the wait. At the moment, about two thirds of the site works tolerably, with probably one half of that running perfectly. The other third just isn’t there yet.

I realised a while ago that IWpaths.co.uk was looking a bit of a mess, and needed a refresh. Those chunky menus on both sides of the screen and random blue and green bars along the top and bottom just left a tiny window in the middle for the actual content – things like photos, descriptions and maps. Well no more.

I don’t know it it will all get done for Friday, but the aim is to change all the pages on the site to be IWpaths ‘Version 2.0′. Those of you who are aware of such things will be know of the term

Web 2.0

but that’s not what I mean.

Web 2.0 is all about interactivity – letting you change what appears on the screen (relatively) simply. It’s the sort of thing Facebook became famous for. Now to be honest, I don’t have the time to work out how to do all of that, but even if I did, I’m not sure it would help. If you would like a comment added to a page, there is a ‘contact form’, and that’s probably all there will be for the time being.

IWpaths Version 2.0 is more about aesthetics than content. The idea is to make the whole site consistent and look good. While there will be lots of new content added as part of the process (for example, new photos and maps are online already), the biggest difference you should notice is how much cleaner the site will look. Some of the site was already ‘version 2.0′ when it dropped out of cyberspace, but much of it was not, notably the main pages for the Coast Path and Cycle Routes.

All these changes take time, and of course, lots and lots of testing. I don’t expect every page to be done by the re-launch, but I hope you’ll agree that it is worth the wait.

It's a long way down! St Catherine's Down stops above Blackgang and the rock just drops away