Update on the future of the site

[ascender]

As you know, this site has been around for a good few years now but has never really become the resource that the users and owners deserve. I have no problem admitting that for various reasons, the fault for that lies squarely with me. As a result, we've been talking about how to get the place sorted out once and for all.

We are in communication with people at the moment to provide the following:

1. More reliable hosting with a faster database for the forum.

2. A professional re-design of the site and forum.

We'll let you know as soon as we have new deals sorted and we can get things moving. We will then be looking for people who are willing to moderate the site and also take ideas for what you'd like to see on the re-designed site.

I have updated my user profile, so I will now get notified of any new PMs to my phone whenever you send them, so don't hesitate to get in contact if you have anything at all to say.

Thanks for your continued patience and support.


Mike & Si.

[pdwarren]

Progress

I'm happy to announce that we've been quietly making progress on this and are now ready to do the first part of these changes.

Over the next few days, we will be moving the site to a new and faster host. This will happen in two stages. Firstly, the front page will start being served from the new server, but the forum and gallery will remain on the old server. You'll notice some minor changes to the front page, but no improvement to the speed of the site.

A day or so later, we complete the move. This will require the site to be unavailable for between 30 minutes and an hour, probably one evening this week, whilst we shift the data across. I've been playing with a test installation of the site on the new server over the last few weeks and it is consistently more responsive than the current host, so I'm confident that this move will prove worthwhile.

Mike is still working on getting a web designer to give the site a re-design - more news on this to follow.

Paul

[coupe fan]

..........

[ZZZEMMCO]

Updates

Well done Paul , Mike & Si, look forward to a speed update + other ideas.Advise us of support required that can make this site THE ZMC No 1 for owners present and future.

[ascender]

Paul's doing some great work and we're so close to getting the speed of the site sorted out which was the first goal. We've also got meetings with web designers tomorrow about doing a professional re-design of the site and forum.

[pdwarren]

Everything is now moved and running on the new server. Sorry the move took a little longer than forecast - it turns out that getting all the old data off a ridiculously overloaded server takes some time!

I've also upgraded to a newer version of the forum software and bumped the PM box limit to 200. Please let me know if you find anything that's not working as it should be.

This new setup should be much faster than it was, but it is still on shared hardware so it's not impossible that we'll hit trouble. If you are experiencing trouble then let me know as it probably means its time for my company to buy some more hardware

Paul

[Broccers]

A million times better already

[coupe fan]

Good one Paul. Are we backed up in the event of a failure?

[ascender]

Its lightning quick from here and from work Paul, nice work

The preferred web designer I've spoken to can't start work on the re-design until April which is a bit of a pain. If anyone knows of someone who is available sooner, that would be another option.

Will we give the site a few days running on the new server and then collate the list of suggestions for improvements and look at those?

[topgeartowers]

Well done chaps - unsung heroes indeed!

[Rags]

Great stuff chaps!

[ascender]

After yet more unsuccessful attempts to get a designer on board, I've got a meeting scheduled tomorrow morning with someone else.

So things are happening, its just that in the world of web design, they seem to be on a totally different clock to the rest of us.

[jke11y]

Hidden graft!

Great work, guys, I've done my bit on golf club and car club committees, for many years, and a wee thank you was always gratefully received, very well done.
JKE11Y

[petecossie]

Well done guys.

You definitely must be doing something right as a new record set yesterday at 06:37 PM with most users ever online - 51.

Keep the good work up.

How did the meeting go Mike?