News, General site updates and Tweets

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(This header section updated/revised 11 March 2022)

News & Press Releases (Updated to 24 December 2021)

1) COVID-19 & Omicron

Due to the general societal relaxation of COVID restrictions from Autumn 2021 onwards a more normal service resumed and several Centres arranged meetings; the National Zoom presentation series is continuing as it offers members remote from physical meetings the opportunity to participate. As COVID is still around despite the removal of many of the official rules and restrictions please check our 'in person' meetings remain on before travelling. (Updated 4 March 2022).

2) Ongoing Library closure/alternative arrangements

Due to circumstances entirely outside our control the Society's own library is currently closed pending relocation. A limited service remains available mostly surrounding access to photographs, with details given in the Society Newsletters or available from the Librarian. To email Gerry Nichols - Librarian

During this closure period alternative arrangements are in place with the RCTS. Full details of how to use the RCTS' Library (located at Leatherhead) as an SLS member, together with latest dates of opening, are contained within the latest SLS Newsletters. This link is to the RCTS Library web-page. Our grateful thanks are expressed to the RCTS for this reciprocal arrangement.

The SLS Newsletter will continue to include progress updates for the RCTS Library opening dates/times(together with information a replacement SLS facility as and when, details can be released (Updated to 18 August 2021).

Recent web-page updates (newest entries first) | Back to the page top

STICKY NOTICES -

1) Please DO NOT USE any contact details included in archive hard-copy Journals. All the current contacts are either on the About us & contacts page or, for Centres, on the Meetings Venues page. Our current General Secretary is Ted Buckley - email details are here.

2) Library - information/update - The latest updates are on the Library page and in the Society Newsletter.

3) As shown in the header a consultant has been employed to redesign the website for Wordpress. As part of this process several sections and pages introduced in the early days of this site will be removed - the internet has moved on and they are no longer needed. (Section revised 20 July 2021)

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27 May - Some dates for the upcoming 2022/23 Autumn to Spring indoor meetings season added to the Perpetual Calendar. (Kidderminster & Newcastle Upon Tyne centres).

12 May - Kidderminster details confirmed and the Perpetual Calendar updated.

2 May: Routine update to the Perpetual Calendar for the month end change. The date for Midlands (Kidderminster) event in May also updated as definately not the 9th - however, confirmation from the organiser is still awaited.

22 Apr: The Perpetual Calendar updated with details for the South Lakes (Kendal) Centre's extra meeting date (ii1th May).

7 Apr: Replacement SPC web information PDF loaded as the postal rates have chnaged. Slightly late but the routine month changed made to the meetings calendar, also minor text amendments to the Photgraph Collection page.

12 Mar: The links check mentioned below completed and the handful of rogues are now deleted (duplicated files missed in an earlier deletion exercise).

11 Mar: Some changes to the page layout in the header section above. Since the restructuring of the folders some links in the Archived Pages section remain in need of updating - this comntinues as a work in progress.

10 Mar: The Perpetual Calendar updated with details for Kidderminster Centre's next two dates. The previously announced full review and update to the Stephenson Photographic Collection section, including new list links, has been completed with many lists updated. In particular please ensure you download the new versions of the PDFs before use.

6 Mar: After a fraught few days the site is back up and running. More testing will be done but, hopefully, our web manager has corrected most of the bugs and the restructuring of the files behind the scenes will aid future upgrades. The next job on the list is a few postal rate and other changes to the Stephenson Photographic Collection pages.

5 Mar: (3) That is me closing down for the night folks. Although there is more still to do a lot of progress made today on correcting the issues, unfortunately many of the broken links can only be fixed manually and singly.

5 Mar: (2) Fixes are progressing, with many already made. Uploads are being done regularly as the bugs and corruptions are corrected. We are prioritising fixing broken links, with page format errors to be the step 2 action. Fortunately the Perpetual Calendar file was not corrupted, Two updates received for next week's meetings and the relevant entries updated.

5 Mar: (1) We haven't been hacked although it looks it - unfortunately an automated feature of the software being used (Adobe Dreamweaver) has inexplicably changed many of the file names within the code from upper case to lower case and made other unexpected file name changes too. Off-line it all works with links that should have been auto-updated still linking to duplicated files that are to be deleted etc..., etc... It is going to be a long day but please bear with us as our web site wrangler attempts the necessary recovery actions.

4 Mar: The find and fixing of bugs and glitches will be ongoing during the day. The first has now been identified and replacement files uploaded.

3 Mar: (3) As can be seen from the site header above the major site reorganisation to create a split between a section comprising the essential live/active pages and a section for the older, and relatively static site elements was completed and the upload of the replacement site layout undertaken today. Although updates to our older pages may occur, this will be infrequent, hence the Archived pages name for the new sub section. This change is the initial, key, step towards enabling the live side of the website to be updated to Wordpress, the archive pages are likely to be left, as now, with their html coding. Testing has identified that some inter-page link corruptions have occurred where the automated process has partially failed, these are upper-case/lower-case issues in the main. These will be addressed by our Website Manager over the next day or so, and we apologise if you find a glitch in the interim period.

3 Mar: (2) Uploading of the new site layout commenced at approximately 13:30 and is now concluded. See note (3) above.

3 Mar: (1) Further page text changes, too many to list, and the reorganisation of the site layout into a series of sub-folders now completed ready for the upload this afternoon.

2 Mar: (2) As part of the revision some pages are also being edited. To date these are the, Early Railways introduction, Early locomotives and the Site map/index page.

2 Mar: (1) Work in progress today - the significant file moves and URL revisions announced in the header block have been started today. Please report any links that the automated process has not correctly adjusted and that we have missed in our off site checks.

1 Mar: Routine update to the Perpetual Calendar for the month change. A navigation code error on the Perpetual Calendar's side bar also seen and corrected.

20 Feb: Updated contact details for the Manchester Centre on our Meetings and venues page.

12 Feb: Updated contact details for the Newcastle Centre on our Meetings and venues page.

10 Feb: A further update to the Perpetual Calendar and other related content as the organisers have had to cancel the 2022 York Model Railway Show.

8 Feb: Further changes to the order of the headings and links on those pages not updated on the 6th so as to aid consistency across the site .

6 Feb: Various changes to the order of the headings and links. An update to the About us & contacts page regarding reciprocal membership links and benefits. Link to the LCI added to the side bar navigation menu. Text amendments to the Public Sales/Publications page.

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Older entries removed as obsolete.

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