Beneath the Ice
Updated by Richard on Wednesday 27th April 2016 at 02:16 PM
A bit of technical detail on how the site is engineered (for anybody that's interested), plus a few credits for free stuff on the web!
IceColdinAlex v2 Banner Photos
Posted by Richard on Friday 8th December 2006 at 12:00 AM
As part of the IceColdinAlex.co.uk v3 redesign, we waved goodbye to the banner photos that used to appear randomly at the top of the menu pages. Gone but not forgotten ...
#40: Back Online
Posted by Richard on Tuesday 14th June 2016 at 12:52 AM
Move to new ISP: CHECK
Upgrade to PHP v5.3: CHECK
Upgrade to MySQL v5.5: CHECK
Upgrade to GoogleMaps API v3: CHECK
Site makeover: CHECK
Site content updates: ...
My last additions were way back in August 2014 - that's 22 months ago. Well, we're now up to date again - 1100 new photos and 77 new pages.
Site content updates: CHECK
IceColdinAlex.co.uk back online: CHECK :-)
#39: Complimentary
Posted by Richard on Tuesday 10th May 2016 at 01:21 PM
Last year we asked Laura's nephew, Thomas to recreate the iconic bar scene from "Ice Cold in Alex" for us - his first commission, and hopefully the first of many. It now has pride of place in our
new kitchen. Inspired by Tom's artwork, I've given IceColdinAlex.co.uk a complimentary look.
"Ice Cold in Alex" (2015) by Thomas Hudson
» Richard (2/12/2015) 
IceColdinAlex.co.uk (v3.07): Complimentary look
#38: Farewell to POBox Internet
Posted by Richard on Friday 6th May 2016 at 12:13 AM
For 16 years IceColdinAlex.co.uk was hosted by the same ISP, POBox Internet (originally Cheapnet). Alas, they went out of business at the end of 2015, so we had to move on. On the recommendation of a friend, we're now with
Falcoda Internet. It had better work out! ;-)
Not unexpectedly, the move 'broke' the website - it had been running on 10 year-old versions of PHP and MySQL. Part way through rewriting my code, Google stopped supporting the version of the GoogleMaps API that I'd been using, so I had to rewrite that too.
It's all taken quite a while but, with the exception of the 'Search' functionality, everything is working again now. Hopefully, no more changes required for the next ten years...
#37: Ditto
Posted by Richard on Tuesday 12th August 2014 at 01:02 AM
Twelve months on and another massive backlog cleared - almost 500 photos on 39 new pages, including trips to
Berlin,
Prague,
Ottawa and
Saint Martin.
#36: That was the year that was
Posted by Richard on Tuesday 20th August 2013 at 01:11 AM
Another massive backlog of photos cleared, almost a year since my last updates. Over 600 photos on 50 new pages, including last year's holiday in
France and this year's trip to
Spain.
#35: Timeline
Posted by Richard on Thursday 2nd August 2012 at 04:51 PM
Not to be outdone by Facebook, our pages can now be displayed chronologically on the
Timeline.
#34: Slideshow
Posted by Richard on Saturday 9th June 2012 at 01:15 AM
Revamped the photo pages to include some nifty slideshow functionality:
GalleryView. Tested it on (versions of) IE, Chrome, Firefox and Safari ... seems OK. :-)
IceColdinAlex.co.uk (v3.06): GalleryView
#33: Cooking on gas!
Posted by Richard on Friday 25th May 2012 at 07:10 PM
I've set a new record: all photos from our latest holiday on the website in less than a week! See how we got on with our coast-to-coast walk on the
Hadrian's Wall Path.
#32: Up to date ...
Posted by Richard on Wednesday 9th May 2012 at 10:37 PM
... almost! The last updates to the site content were in March 2011, so I had a bit of a backlog to tackle. 23 new pages and over 470 new photos now been added, including trips to
Pembrokeshire,
The Cotswolds and
Maldives. Enjoy!
#31: Tabs
Posted by Richard on Sunday 3rd April 2011 at 12:44 PM
I've changed the way that information is displayed under the main page details - Blog Entries, Next Pages and Comments are now shown in a tabbed format. Much better! ;-)
IceColdinAlex.co.uk (v3.05): Tabs
#30: Happy New Year
Posted by Richard on Friday 31st December 2010 at 11:59 AM
Only two updates to the website in the whole of 2010! To be honest I'd been dreading the task of distilling the 853 photos taken on our
summer holiday into a more manageable number! Anyway, job completed on New Year's Eve. Over 20 new pages and 271 new photos. Enjoy...
#29: Calamity ...
Posted by Richard on Monday 14th June 2010 at 05:06 PM
... it's been six months since my last updates! Another 121 photos for you to enjoy including Mark's perfomance in
Calamity Jane.
Calamity Jane
#28: The Fast and the not-at-all-Furious
Posted by Richard on Monday 11th January 2010 at 12:32 AM
Very satisfied with my latest update to the site ... something that should have been done ages ago, I've sped up the display of photos. Pages with lots of photos should now display in a 10th of the time! :-)
#27: 300!
Posted by Richard on Sunday 13th December 2009 at 09:02 PM
No, not Spartans - I've been a bit slack with updates to the website this year. In fact, the prospect of clearing a six month backlog has stopped me taking photos for the last two months. But, at last, back up to date, with over 300 new photos: Laura and Debbie in
Venice, Richard and Mark in the
Peak District,
Trevor and Fang's wedding, the family holiday in
France and many, many more. Enjoy!
#26: Let it snow
Posted by Richard on Saturday 28th February 2009 at 11:34 PM
Snow
home and
abroad in the latest updates. Also, Mark's big-stage debut in
A Midsummer Night's Dream.
Front row seats for the last night
#25: Italian Job
Posted by Richard on Saturday 11th October 2008 at 02:06 AM
Another mammoth update completed - we took over 600 photos between us on our trip to
Umbria in Italy. Fortunately I didn't have to find captions for them all!
#24: Search me!
Posted by Richard on Sunday 29th June 2008 at 01:05 AM
Check out our new
Search functionality.
#23: Who says size isn't important?
Posted by Richard on Tuesday 17th June 2008 at 02:10 AM
It's almost 2:15am and I've just spent the best part of three days resizing every photo put on the website prior to September 2005 - that's over 900 photos! Please tell me it was worth it. :-(
#22: Putting IceColdinAlex on the Map
Posted by Richard on Monday 12th May 2008 at 12:49 AM
... or more precicely, putting the map on IceColdinAlex. This has been a real labour of love - i.e. incredible frustration and general moodiness ... all taken out on the kids. Sorry!
So, now, all 'geographic' pages have a link to our
On the Map page which uses Google Maps to show the places we've visited . Not only has this challenged my creaking programming skills, but I've had to find the latitude and longitude for over 160 locations!
Google Maps on IceColdinAlex.co.uk
#21: Lost and Found
Posted by Richard on Sunday 6th April 2008 at 09:11 PM
As well as adding in photos from our latest globe-trotting trip to see
Liz in Israel, I've included a new page to help people
navigate the site.
You can now use previous and next buttons to flip from page to page, and I've also added a little widget to let you know that photos are being downloaded - it doesn't make it any quicker, but at least you now have something vaguely hypnotic to look at. :-)
#18: At long last ... IceColdinAlex.co.uk v3
Posted by Richard on Friday 8th December 2006 at 11:32 PM
Well, it's certainly taken some time to get the new version out here. I just hope you like it - 'cos there ain't no going back! ;-)
IceColdinAlex.co.uk (v3): All new
#17: Time for a Change
Posted by Richard on Tuesday 13th September 2005 at 12:00 AM
It's been four years since the site went through its last radical rewrite, so time for a change! We're up to date for the moment -
summer holidays, etc. all accounted for - but I have a feeling there may be a bit of a wait for the next updates. Sorry!
#16: Summer Holidays in November
Posted by Richard on Wednesday 17th November 2004 at 12:00 AM
Another lazy spell - no changes for 4 months! Back up to date now, with our summer trips to
Snowdonia and
Tour de France.
#15: Adam and Mark on the World Wide Web
Posted by Richard on Sunday 4th April 2004 at 12:00 AM
Two more new websites - and these really do have nothing to do with me! - check out
Adam's Home Page and
Mark's Home Page at your own risk!
#14: Farewell to the Wanderers
Posted by Richard on Thursday 29th January 2004 at 12:00 AM
The Knaphill Wanderers Football Club pages have now moved to a new website,
kwfc.org.uk ... that bears more than a passing resemblance to IceColdinAlex.co.uk!
Kwfc.org.uk: Home Page
#13: Backlog Blitz
Posted by Richard on Friday 28th November 2003 at 12:00 AM
I've been a bit lazy over the last few months, but now I've blitzed the backlog and the site is once more up to date - right up to our
trip to Barcelona to celebrate Laura's
somethingth Birthday.
#12: A Labour of Love ...
Posted by Richard on Sunday 9th February 2003 at 12:00 AM
Eighteen months in the making, and at last the Knaphill Wanderers FC pages have been completely rewritten. Player profiles, team details, fixtures, results, goal scorers and match reports, are now all entered into a database, with the screens generated dynamically. Now that should make it easier to keep the results up to date.
#11: What's New?
Posted by Richard on Monday 22nd July 2002 at 12:00 AM
Quite a bit of tinkering but not a lot to show for it, except for the
What's New page.
#10: Long Awaited Relaunch!
Posted by Richard on Monday 1st October 2001 at 12:00 AM
Welcome to the 'all new' IceColdinAlex.co.uk! OK, so it may not look radically different - the IKEA effect making way for something slightly more frosty - but under the surface, well ...
do you really care?
IceColdinAlex.co.uk (v2): Home Page
#9: Nothing to Report
Posted by Richard on Thursday 7th June 2001 at 12:00 AM
Five months since the previous entry, but not much has changed. I am working on a new PHP / MySQL version of the site, but don't hold your breath!
#8: Happy New Year and Happy Birthday
Posted by Richard on Wednesday 3rd January 2001 at 12:00 AM
As the new year is ushered in, IceColdinAlex.co.uk celebrates its first birthday - still self-indulgent; still lacking news, facts, entertainment and informed opinion; and still waiting for Laura's contributions ... but now with a
Guestbook!
#7: Get Your Kit On
Posted by Richard on Friday 10th November 2000 at 12:00 AM
Knaphill Knights secure lucrative sponsorship deal with TG Engineering.
Knaphill Knights U9s
» Richard (3/12/2000)
#6: Storm Damage
Posted by Richard on Thursday 5th October 2000 at 12:00 AM
Remember kids, don't leave your modem plugged in during a thunderstorm. So much for the up to date results service!
Futuristic cityscape or storm damaged modem?
» Richard (14/10/2000)
#5: First Knight
Posted by Richard on Friday 15th September 2000 at 12:00 AM
Last season may have finished before the Knaphill Knights' pages were ready, but this season we've hit the ground running with the first match report hot off the press. I hope that keeping these results up to date doesn't become too much of a bind ...
#4: I can see clearly now the frames have gone ...
Posted by Richard on Sunday 2nd July 2000 at 12:00 AM
The frames make way for a nifty JavaScript menu - well frames are so yesterday!
IceColdinAlex.co.uk (v1.1) Home Page
#3: You've Been Framed!
Posted by Richard on Monday 1st May 2000 at 12:00 AM
Precious little new content, but look at those frames!
#2: Up and Running
Posted by Richard on Friday 31st March 2000 at 12:00 AM
Months in the planning, and the site finally has some content. Some survives to this day, but unfortunately the original logo is lost in a freak formatting accident.
Name that font ...
#1: A Site is Born
Posted by Richard on Monday 3rd January 2000 at 12:00 AM
IceColdinAlex.co.uk is registered - the domain we had planned to use had been pinched four days earlier and all the good ones had gone! Our first home page is launched a few days later; unfortunately there is no record of this early masterpiece!
