The Isle of Wight Council’s website will soon look very different as the Beta website that’s been in testing for the past year goes live as the local authority’s new main website.
From Monday (3rd April), visitors will be able to access all of the council’s web pages on a single site as the Beta version is migrated onto iow.gov.uk.
Unfortunately, the switchover from the older website will mean some disruption to online services, including online payments and waste requests, throughout tomorrow (Thursday).
The work is scheduled to take place from 06:00 to midnight tomorrow and will require downtime of both websites. Service delivery will be restored as soon as possible.
As previously reported by Island Echo, the new website comes at a cost of £765,000 and it was initially hoped that the Beta website would be launched in September 2020, but was beset by delays until May 2022.
The new website will offer improved features and functionality and the Council hopes to achieve a website that works on all devices and is responsive to user needs.
765k what a bargain they really know how to spend our money
Most organisations would do a switch over at the weekend to minimise disruption but not this shower. See they are still squandering our hard earned money.
Or even over night…
Let’s face it, after spending (wasting?) £765k. A little overtime for the IT guys wouldn’t break the bank…
we dont get overtime. Also do it over April 1st? No way.
Money well spent, not.
As expected, people posting comments when they know nothing of what they are talking about. This site is more than just a front page and some forms. There is a lot of work needed to the backend to tie it too all their other systems. And all this work has to be discovered in the requirements elicitation process. Just because you can go on WIXS and pay £20 click a few buttons to make a shop front does mean the same can be said for a council website. Also that fee will include a lot of support work. This is a bespoke system. It’s like asking for a custom Gurage to be built and expecting it to cost the same as an Agos £300 special.
Hope the spellchecker on the new website is better than yours.
Somehow I doubt it, because the article says they, “hope it works on all devices, and is responsive to user needs”.£765,000 on something they hope works. Unbelievable.
Yes, but three quarters of a million Pounds worth of work? You can’t seriously be saying that you think the Council haven’t paid over the odds for it? Or maybe you think three quarters of a million Pounds for a website is good use of taxpayers money and good value?
Suppose you or yours work for the council. Waste of money and a waste of space just like the council idiots that are employed there.
Thanks for your taxes. Yum yum yum.
Other government agencies use Beta but better it’s not, very confusing to navigate etc. How does it cost £750,000 when Council have own IT dept?. Like mobile phones, Council pays 3/4 times more than members of public and toilet rolls 3x that of Asda and paper for printers double of Tesco etc etc . Need for proper procurement and could save millions.
IT != software engineering though! Totally different skill sets.
If you find the new site confusing you need your eyes checked. xD
Hope it works better than the last piece of sh!te.
Well, it doesn’t need me as a B.Sc. to work out what mugs will be copping the bill for this shite does it? You can spend what ever you like on what ever you like all the time some other poor sod will be copping the bill eh? And I wouldn’t mind betting it’s ALL still an unadulterated balls up. What say you? Lets see some up thumbs in agreement.No one in there will have a bloody clue how to use it for a start, and we’ll end up with another half grand bill for training
Are you sure it’s a BSc and not a CSE?
What a waste of money, may help employees more by them working from home, but does very little for those with no internet connection or knowledge of this technical age which is quite a few on the Island. Think they need to postpone switch on with weather forecast, it will go down quicker than when it became live. Hope they have servers in a really cold room so they are ready for the heat wave, and I hope they managed a fix utilities rate prior to massive rise in electricity costs. I wish they would take into account the total cost of alterations, not only now but future costs. No doubt it will need updating again in 5 years. Shakespeare was correct the Pen is mightier.
From perspective of Site Reliability Engineer of 10 years experience all I can say is: no, sir, you’re mistaken – it will not require updating in 5 years but rather it’ll require CONSTANT updates just to keep it safe and running as-is. That’s how web works. Vulnerabilities in various coding libraries and protocols are found daily, and patches released and applied daily as well.
To paint a perspective: a DNS provider that tells your browser (or rather operating system) that islandecho.co.uk should go to machine with IP address 104.26.8.166 has dozens of people keeping that info safe and patching their systems every day. And that’s just 1 part of 100s that allow you to read this comment. Internet requires constant maintenance.
Thank you for your input, I am sure all appreciate that it will be costing us daily for constant updates which can also cause constant interruptions. The 5 year updating could well turn out to be a 5 year replacement plan instead.
That would have covered 30 staff being paid £25,000 each.
NO, it would have covered three staff being paid £250,000 each with this greedy, corrupt and inefficient jobs for the boys shower.
Yeah, but software engineers don’t work on £25k. You will get a decent junior at £40k.
Iow Council software engineers are all on around 40k. Band 11.
Island wages are low. Local auth wages are low.
Nothing wrong with what we had was there ?
2 years late, over budget, and guaranteed to crash on the first day. Not only that come next year we’ll be told it’s outdated and in need of a replacement
Looking at the image provided, it is evident that the IWCC has not considered those with disabilities. There is no clear navigation tool from the picture, allowing the user to change the settings to cater for those with disabilities such as dyslexia, colour blindness, and font size.
I would have thought, for £765k, this essential requirement would have been built into the cost; clearly not.
So many people with disabilities are always ‘an afterthought’. With so many public bodies now expecting consumers to do everything ‘online’, you would have thought the IWCC would have considered such inclusion with the new website.
Does the IWCC not have an Inclusion & Diversity Manager?
The last thing anyone needs is more inclusion and diversity managers! Look how they’ve trashed the NHS! All you ever need to do is ask a disabled person! Simple. I’m sure many would happily help!
>There is no clear navigation tool from the picture
Is blindless part of your disabilities? Cant you see the search bar?
>allowing the user to change the settings to cater for those with disabilities such as dyslexia, colour blindness, and font size.
Modern web browsers already do this better than any developer could replicate. So it’s wasteful work.
>I would have thought, for £765k, this essential requirement would have been built into the cost; clearly not.
WCAG2.1 AA is a minimum these days.
>So many people with disabilities are always ‘an afterthought’.
The website was tested with a number of blind users. So you are talking out of your behind Sir.
Beggers belief, there are 140,400 people on the Isle of Wight the council could have given each of us £5.448 to help with the cost of living. I thought they were cash-strapped obviously rolling in it. We all will have to see this amazing website now out of curiosity no doubt it will crash costing more for a reboot lol
and they didn’t have enough to keep the Law Centre going
Wait until you see how much they spend on repairing pavements where people park 😉
I think with the amount of money mentioned this would have come from another fund (within the Council’s remit) but it is a disgusting amount in the current financial period within the whole of the UK.
Got to be better than the previous wooden version
I know nothing about website design. But I know our council! If they can cock something up, they will! I can only go with previous ‘improvements’ they’ve made: Cowes Enterprise College and the Floating bridge. Both shocking displays of waste and mismanagement
Nepotism contracts for some