CWGC: Changes, Updates & Access difficulties

Discussion in 'War Cemeteries & War Memorial Research' started by Monty, Mar 18, 2004.

  1. jonheyworth

    jonheyworth Senior Member


    A succinct and sadly all too true précis on all too many bodies
     
  2. Skoyen89

    Skoyen89 Senior Member

    Perhaps if we all fed back to the CWGC they might hear these valid views. Whilst I agree with Robert-W on their initial role if they are entrusted with key sets of data then they also have a duty to make that available rather than hoard it. I find it amazing that there are major gaps in the information retained and available to the researcher. If all this data was held at one institution such as TNA and the savings used to digitise it all we wouldn't have these issues.
     
  3. Robert-w

    Robert-w Banned

    However TNA is primarily a British establishment whilst the CWGC is a Commonwealth one. There are Australian, Canadian. Indian, African, New Zealand etc etc etc graves under its auspices and the data they hold does not just "belong" to the UK
     
  4. jonheyworth

    jonheyworth Senior Member

    What appears to be utterly shite , or am I being stupid ? - is that you can no longer search for a date of death “ between x and y “ only a specific day / month / year date ?
     
  5. brithm

    brithm Senior Member

    In the CWGC rebrand some of the airmen are missing their positions in the aircraft Pilot, Navigator, Wirelss Operator, Bomb Aimer etc
     
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  6. Rich Payne

    Rich Payne Rivet Counter Patron 1940 Obsessive

    You're right, Jon. If you hover over the 'Help' icon, it suggests searching a date range but doesn't say how. I've tried every format that I can think of and see nothing other than an error message.
     
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  7. jonheyworth

    jonheyworth Senior Member

    I did wonder if it was me rich as I’m more than a little dyslexic ! Geoff’s Search engine it is then . If you can only search for individuals and can’t look up any concentration info it’s bloody useless as a research tool . You’d be hard put to even find a relative who died in say 1944 and was called Jones
     
  8. alberk

    alberk Well-Known Member

    Hello,
    I have tried to access the concentration reports on the redesigned "Find War Dead"-site for several days now. "Image could not be loaded" was all I got. I know others have complained about this on this forum - do we know what the CWGC has to say about that problem?
     
  9. gmyles

    gmyles Senior Member

    Hi

    I've emailed CWGC about the dates and concentration images issues.

    I politely reminded them that if something works, it shouldn't be messed with.

    And choosing style over substance is never going to end well.

    Gus
     
  10. Tony56

    Tony56 Member Patron

    "Thank you for your recent e mail. We do currently have some of our regular features missing on our new website, which includes the feature you have identified. This is temporary and our teams are working hard to get these features back on our new website as soon as possible.

    We value your support and interest and I am sorry that we have caused you inconvenience on this occasion."
     
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  11. alberk

    alberk Well-Known Member

    Thanks, Tony56 - that sounds comforting...
    I am curious to see how long it'll take them.
     
  12. Robert-w

    Robert-w Banned

    Which means either that
    a] They didn't test it properly before releasing it
    b] They were prepared to release it knowing that chunks were missing or didn't work
    Either is sloppy but not untypical of the public sector. One has to ask what was the pressure to get it out before it was working properly?
     
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  13. alberk

    alberk Well-Known Member

    What was the pressure to change it at all? It looked good and it worked. Now it looks only slighty different and it doesn't work anymore.
     
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  14. Charley Fortnum

    Charley Fortnum Dreaming of Red Eagles

    You are clearly not senior management material.
     
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  15. gmyles

    gmyles Senior Member

    Hi

    I am no website designer, but my time at college, 15 years ago, taught me that CSS or Cascading Style Sheets allow for changing style and font changes without having to rewrite the HTML code itself. But as CSS can be responsible for the change in the websites looks and feel, I doubt if it is responsible for the images being missing.

    If you hover over a missing image it comes up with something like this.

    upload_2020-8-11_11-32-20.png

    If this is new. Then this would suggest that CWGC have now put all of their images on to the cloud.

    According to this link they started using the cloud for back-ups back in 2014.

    https://www.cloudpro.co.uk/cloud-essentials/4327/war-grave-archive-goes-into-the-cloud

    Maybe its the snippet of code that creates a unique URL for each document that is wrong.

    Gus
     
    Last edited: Aug 11, 2020
    alberk likes this.
  16. Robert-w

    Robert-w Banned

    Many years ago I was on a board reviewing the IT workings of a large government department. Part of the questioning of one member of senior management went something like this -

    Q Why does this department have so many bespoke systems when others use off the shelf ready made packages?
    A We have a large number of very expert and experienced programmers. If we weren't involved in producing complex software many would leave and go elsewhere.
    Q Why do you need all those expert and experienced programmers?
    A To maintain all the bespoke systems we use.
     
  17. jonheyworth

    jonheyworth Senior Member


    I’ve done likewise Gus
     
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  18. bamboo43

    bamboo43 Very Senior Member

    I too have sent them an email. If the CWGC was not bad enough right now, my Yahoo email has also changed the outlook of their email home page and navigation. It takes longer to load up and at present, all spam is coming straight into the Inbox for me to sort. The only email to go into spam over the past week was an important family reply along with photograph attachments!!
     
  19. gmyles

    gmyles Senior Member

    Hi

    CWGC's reply

    Dear Mr Myles

    Thank you for your feedback on our new website.

    We do currently have some of our regular features missing, which includes:

    • Archive documents

    • Full casualty Commemoration Certificates

    • Cemetery plans

    • Date-range search function

    This is temporary and our teams are working hard to get these back on our new website as soon as possible and we aim to have them all reinstated within the coming weeks.

    CWGC does value your support, we have simply let our customers down during the deployment of our new site. I am sorry that we have caused you inconvenience and disappointment.

    Yours sincerely

    Can't fault their response and openness, however "Working Hard" and "Coming Weeks" seems to be somewhat of a of contradiction in terms.

    Or is it maybe my old armed forces "want it done and I want it done by yesterday" mentality coming through?

    Gus
     
    Last edited: Aug 11, 2020
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  20. jonheyworth

    jonheyworth Senior Member

    It gets worse . Now when you try to find some names you KNOW are right it comes up :

    Page not found
     
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