End of the Search Engine? - CWGC Search Changes

Discussion in 'War Cemeteries & War Memorial Research' started by Paul Reed, Sep 7, 2009.

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  1. Paul Reed

    Paul Reed Ubique

    Completely unannounced, today the CWGC changed the way their Debt of Honour register works. In doing so they have changed the URL syntax of every CWGC entry, which means both of Geoff's Search Engines will no longer work, as they link to pages which no longer exist in the CWGC database. It also means all CWGC links placed on this forum will no longer work, either!

    They have also changed the URL of the search page - a very strange thing to do - which is now:

    :: CWGC :: - Search Our Records

    This is a real shame, as I know I am one of many on here who uses Geoff's excellent sites.

    Will you be able to get round this in due course Geoff?
     
  2. dbf

    dbf Moderatrix MOD

    Completely unannounced, today the CWGC changed the way their Debt of Honour register works. In doing so they have changed the URL syntax of every CWGC entry, which means both of Geoff's Search Engines will no longer work, as they link to pages which no longer exist in the CWGC database. It also means all CWGC links placed on this forum will no longer work, either!

    They have also changed the URL of the search page - a very strange thing to do - which is now:

    :: CWGC :: - Search Our Records

    This is a real shame, as I know I am one of many on here who uses Geoff's excellent sites.

    Will you be able to get round this in due course Geoff?

    Thanks Paul for heads up on this.

    ...There too go my entire Guards' spreadsheets. Total bummer.

    D
     
  3. Rob Dickers

    Rob Dickers 10th MEDIUM REGT RA

  4. Paul Reed

    Paul Reed Ubique

    I suspect you won't be alone; I have loads of research where I just downloaded the results from Geoff's site with the links to CWGC embedded. Now they are all useless!
     
  5. von Poop

    von Poop Adaministrator Admin

    Just testing.
    Both of these were linked directly to the casualty.
    For the moment taking the link from the specific casualty page only directs to the full list of that surname. At least that's something.

    It does look like that's one of those 'search session' URLs that expires after a while though - we'll see if these decay:

    :: CWGC ::

    :: CWGC ::

    Looks like we might have to get the hang of attaching pdfs, (as they don't open as a separate URL either), or just pasting in details.

    This looks seriously problematic for Geoff doesn't it? - I too hope he can work around it, as his engines obviously help so much with research, but it seems like the whole search potential has been obfuscated without 'proper' URLs for individual casualties...

    ~A
     
  6. dbf

    dbf Moderatrix MOD

    I suspect you won't be alone; I have loads of research where I just downloaded the results from Geoff's site with the links to CWGC embedded. Now they are all useless!

    Paul
    I don't think I will be - in fact I know I won't - I even recommended this method a few times to others researching Regiments...

    I guess that the forum might be a little quieter now, while we all play catch up with the records... or will those of us who diligently used Geoff's engine to dig up and post lists of Fallen now have to go back and manually input same ?

    D
     
  7. englandphil

    englandphil Very Senior Member

    Thanks Paul for heads up on this.

    ...There too go my entire Guards' spreadsheets. Total bummer.

    D

    And my South Lancs one, which 1,500 names later was finalised last night

    :mad::mad::mad:
     
  8. von Poop

    von Poop Adaministrator Admin

    Ah, copied the actual link to the pdf version and that's a normal link.
    http://www.cwgc.org/PDFHandler.ashx?t=a2&ca=715609&ce=0&me=0&ma=0
    Still a sight clumsier than just linking to a page though.

    Noticed you can't use the browsers back button from the results page, so each search has to be redone - Can't open the search results in a new tab either, so the whole search system has apparently been isolated from the results - hmmmm.
     
  9. dbf

    dbf Moderatrix MOD

    Geoff,
    I do hope that all those man-hours of yours are salvageable...
    D
     
  10. Paul Reed

    Paul Reed Ubique

    The addition of the pdf facility is useful, but the fact that results are not permanent is mind-boggling and the change of syntax and URL very odd indeed. I think of sites all over the net that have been made redundant by this.
     
  11. englandphil

    englandphil Very Senior Member

    I have just written to them askingf the, nicely if they realise what they have done by making these unannounced changes.

    P
     
  12. dbf

    dbf Moderatrix MOD

    I suspect some techie has thought this was ideal long-term solution to cwgc engine's short-comings, without thinking about cost to those who are essentially linked into not only the pages, but the whole idea of commemoration.

    0 of 10 so far for effort I'm afraid, as I noticed nothing new in the search fields themselves either. [What's that about 'advanced' search options anyway ...] And the cert page, not the pdf version, now looks very amateurish.

    Hrmpf.
     
  13. Jerome

    Jerome Junior Member

    This may seem paranoid on my part, but I wonder if this was not a deliberate change to circumvent Geoff's excellent and successful search engine?

    To ?upgrade/ & change their data to pdf format must have been quite an undertaking - why then could they not have included additional search fields as Geoff did and make life simpler for everyone. This is not an up-grade it is a retro-grade

    Maybe too many criticisms about errors & omissions as in this site http://www.cwgc.co.uk/ .
     
  14. Smudger Jnr

    Smudger Jnr Our Man in Berlin

    It appears to be another case of making changes (not necessarily for the better) and without any thought to the further ramifications.

    It would have been nice of the CWGC to broadcast their intentions in order to see just how many peoples work was effected, instead of just changing things overnight and unannounced.

    I really feel for everyone that has spend many hours of work to see it all but disappear overnight, with a lot more work being required to rectify the situation.

    Regards and best wishes to all those effected.

    Tom
     
  15. Peter Clare

    Peter Clare Very Senior Member

    Thanks for the heads on this up Paul. It doesn't effect me in any detrimental way but I feel for others that it does.

    I receive a CWGC e-newsletter each month but can find no mention of this change.

    Regards
    Peter
     
  16. von Poop

    von Poop Adaministrator Admin

    Could you sort the results by field on the previous variant?

    Not a patch on what you can/could do with Geoff's Engine (still having to start searches with only a name) but maybe a slight improvement there?
    Just can't recall now if you could do that anyway...
     
  17. Paul Reed

    Paul Reed Ubique

    Could you sort the results by field on the previous variant?

    Not a patch on what you can/could do with Geoff's Engine (still having to start searches with only a name) but maybe a slight improvement there?
    Just can't recall now if you could do that anyway...

    Very few people realised you could, but yes you could do that before.
     
  18. geoff501

    geoff501 Achtung Feind hört mit

    The WW2 engine is back in business, using the pdf links.
    These are rather poor quality.

    cheers
    geoff
     
    englandphil, Owen, dbf and 2 others like this.
  19. englandphil

    englandphil Very Senior Member

    Geoff, i dont know how you managed that so quickly, but is there an wasy way of linking the old URL's with the PDF's.

    I seriously dont want to be having to find 1,500 individual records

    P
     
  20. Philip Reinders

    Philip Reinders Very Senior Member

    pfff lucky escape good work Geoff
     

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