New site features

I took advantage of the long weekend to make a few improvements to the website:

• Documents: I've added a new tool to upload documents to bridge pages. The documents can be in PDF, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, GIF, PNG, TIFF, JPEG, or BMP formats (limit is 100 megabytes per file). This is primarily intended for reports and technical drawings, but could be used for lots of things. See an example here.

• Builders: To help manage the ever-growing list of builders, people are now sorted alphabetically by last name instead of first name. When editing a builder's information, the new "Sort by" box provides a way to specify how the name should be alphabetized.

  I haven't figured out how best to handle companies that include the name of a person (like "A. Guthrie & Co."). These kinds of names are surprisingly common, but for now I haven't touched any of them.

• Photo numbers: Each photo now includes an ID number that can be used for identifying that particular photo in forum comments or elsewhere.

• Garmin POI files: I've uploaded Points of Interest files that can be loaded on Garmin GPS devices. First download garmin.zip (6.8 MB). Included are bridges.gpi (for standing bridges) and lostbridges.gpi (for bridges that are gone). One or both of these files can be transferred to most Germin GPS devices (either by SD card or USB cable connection). More recent devices should have enough internal memory to permanently install the POIs (for older devices it may be necessary to keep an SD card around). Once loaded, going to "Extras" and then "Custom POIs" will show the bridges that are nearest to your current location (the exact menus may vary by model).

  For non-Garmin devices, the ZIP file includes alternate bridges.gpx and lostbridges.gpx files that can be converted to other formats using gpsbabel or other software.

Permalink · View comments (2)