Board logo

To Do List
justal - 21-2-2003 at 09:16

As some of you may know, this site originally started life as a kind of personal site outlining what my friends and I got up to in and around West wales. Its since developed into a site with a much wider geographical range and is still transforming.... It certainly keeps me busy so I thought I'd list the future plans for the site. The idea is that YOU (the sites visitors) can then provide me with some feedback on the ideas before I implement them... SO PLEASE, PLEASE let me know what you think of the following. I'll go through each section outlining what I think could/should be done.

Home Page
I'm as yet undecided whether to leave it essentially as it is, or make it more of a 'window to the rest of the site'. If I went for the latter option I'd keep the 'Latest info' box with the weather forecast and latest news, but have similar boxes for the forums, classifieds and diairy sections listing the latest entries etc. so that you could see which sections are worth taking a closer look at each day.

Beach Guide
I should at some point make this section database driven so that it is searchable. i.e. you'll be able to find out which beaches to go to in a particular region, to do a particular sport in a particualr wind direction. Thats quite a big job and won't be happening soon, so in the meantime I just need to put in place the maps and framework for more regions starting with:



When I do eventually turn it into a databse driven section I haven't yet decided whether I should allow visitors to add their own location reports directly or not. The main reservation I have about that is that the consistency and accuracy could be compromised.

Places
This section is a bit out of date and parochial now, but i'd still like to keep something like it. What I'd like to do is get some people to write short descriptions on their local areas. Not detailed beach guides, but more summaries of the area, what you can do, the general feel of the area, where people tend to congregate etc. So, if you feel like contributing, get in contact with me first and we'll sort something out.

Sports
Another old section which doesn't really fit with the new wider-based site... Any suggestions??

Toys
OK, its very egotistical at the mo, but I have added a link to the Personal Toyboxes! Don't really know what else I can do with this section. So it'll probably stay as it is for a while yet.

Photos
Could do with 'tarting up' a little, but otherwsie OK.. I could add a members photo gallery, but thats what the 'Look at Me' forum is for.

People
Again a leftover from the original Personal site and also out of date. Would it be worth scrapping it and adding a better / extra form to the members profiles so that members could add more details on the sprots they do, the levels they are at and where they usually go?? Would you you it if I did that?

Diaires
Quite happy with this section at the mo, although I will add a 'Hall of Fame' page soon which will show, for any given month:

Good idea??

Links
Needs completely redoing. What would you like to see.. a more comprehensive list of links for each section? A method for members to add links?

For Sale
OK for now, but if the number of ads increases I'll have to either add a search facility or sub-divide the sections better.

Video Review
OK, but it needs more reviews. If you feel like writing one let me know and we'll sort it out by e-mail.

Forums
Fine as they are I hope.

Calendar
OK as it is, but I should make entering events that span several days easier.

Phew...thats it. As I said before, PLEASE let me know what you think of all of these ideas, please let me know of any other new features you think I could / should add to the site and please let me know of any other improvements that you'd like to see. The site is for you, so have you say on how it develops.

Cheers.

Al.

justanna - 21-2-2003 at 09:47

I think the trouble is that the site (good as it is it's 2 sites combined....your personal site with our holiday piccys etc on and a public site with the beach guide, forums etc.

It's a bit difficult to combine our Iceland photos with the windsurfing forums.

If you could keep the personal bit but make it quite separate and develop the main site it could be really good.

I don't think that many people are interested in holiday photos really!

As much as I hate to say it because I know how much work is involved and how much time it will take you, I like the idea of a database driven beach guide. I agree that you don't want just everyone adding descriptions so you could controll that by asking people to submit tham to you first and you can 'edit' them!....unless we're going to go and visit all locations in person! (I'm joking! before you get any ideas).

justal - 21-2-2003 at 12:13

Good points...keep em coming.

In the meantime, I've already added the Hall of Fame bit to the diaires just click on the Hall of Fame link at the top of any of the diary pages.

or click here to see them.

Al.

Dave - 2-5-2003 at 12:11

You could've just had a chat at breakfast

I am suprised Robbie hasn't expressed an opinion.

justanna - 2-5-2003 at 12:59

If only we saw each other at breakfast to chat!

Al's too busy keep ing you lot happy updating his weather forecast ect to have breakfast with me

MartinF - 15-6-2003 at 11:52

Hi Al,

FWIW, I've partly got the Bristol Nomads locations in a database. Whilst - As I'm sure you've already discovered - it can be tricky to keep textual info and photos in a db *without* it becoming too tightly formated & regimented. It's also difficult to write and maintain the code needed to hold different types of data for presentation in an acceptable manner - but I'll work on it a little more when I have the time.

The part I *have* got into a database is the *factual* stuff, insofar as I've actually been able to gather such details: Like what wind directions work for what locations, with a brief description (where available) of the conditions for each of those locations. This has allowed me to facilitate searches for (say) what locations on the S coast work in N wind. If you've not looked already, check out:
http://www.bristolnomads.org.uk/location_reports.htm

It still needs a fair amount of manual work to update the database (though I will one day get round to writing a php application to do that), but I think the search facility that's provided makes it worthwhile (please - anyone - feel free to correct me if I'm wrong!).

Cheers,
Martin

Owen (decker) - 24-6-2003 at 21:03

Some feedback on whats happening about that review you promised about 5 months ago might be nice. I sup.......I'm probably wasting my time

justal - 25-6-2003 at 05:43

Not at all Owen... As I've told you by e-mail and in this thread , its just a bit difficult to review videos whilst living in a caravan without a proper electricity supply and whilst all your pesonal belongings (such as videos) are in storage in inaccessible boxes somewhere.

Sorry... The situation isn't likely to change in the next 6 months either as we haven't even started building the house yet.

Al.

bucski - 3-10-2003 at 15:10

weather forecast section is most useful to me, and am very grateful for your time
what would also real useful is real time weather, i.e. an anemometer linked to a p.c. to give online current wind conditions.
I realise this would cost to maintain and setup and I would be happy to contribute if others were
thanks
tim

justal - 4-10-2003 at 05:57

I'd really like to do it too.... I don't know how much it would cost to set-up and maintain yet. I haven't looked into it yet, as we've only just finsished building the house, once thats sorted properly I'll have to look into the costs of setting up an anenometer.

The main problem would be that I would have to keep my computer online all the time in order to have 'live' uploads of the wind stats. Thats more of a problem than it may sound as we can't get broadband internet here in Borth.

It would be nice to do though

Al.

bucski - 4-10-2003 at 11:59

got ya
i think you need 250 people in your area to warrant broadband being available, so that may be a bit tricky with regards to borth,
I'm not positive about that but I know there is a similar problem in the village where I work and bt needed 250 people wanting broadband before they would supply a line, so presume it would be the same for anywhere else
tim