http://www.planetbods.org/blog/build/images/me.jpg 2008-07-16T12:56:55Z Stuff about the BBC and its products, services, channels, websites and stations. tag:www.planetbods.org,2008:/blog/BBC/2 Movable Type Copyright (c) 2008, Andrew Bowden 2008-07-16T12:56:55Z 2008-07-16T12:49:25Z tag:www.planetbods.org,2008:/blog//2.955

By chance I noticed the an interesting case of BBC related database overload. And it's in the form of recipe databases. Boy, is there a lot...

Andrew Bowden 2008-04-23T08:45:51Z 2008-04-23T08:26:37Z tag:www.planetbods.org,2008:/blog//2.790

As I mentioned recently, the BBC's Doctor Who website recently redesigned and moved their XML feed, without putting a redirect or message in the old feed to point people to the new one.

Andrew Bowden 2008-05-07T20:34:22Z 2008-04-20T08:21:19Z tag:www.planetbods.org,2008:/blog//2.789

Launched in 1999 as freebeeb.net, and later renamed beeb.net, BBC Worldwide's ISP slowly and quietly kept chugging along. By 2001 it had entered profitability with 140,000 users. And it's been around ever since. But this year will be its last - on the 30 June 2008, Beeb will close down and be no more.

Andrew Bowden 2008-04-07T15:20:47Z 2008-04-07T12:48:05Z tag:www.planetbods.org,2008:/blog//2.786

One of the wonders of having XML feeds is that you can keep up to date with what's going on quite nicely from one place instead of having to go through hundreds of different bookmarks, remembering what you've seen and what you've not. And it's something more and more sites are now realising that they should provide, and which will bring them traffic.

Andrew Bowden 2008-03-21T18:39:16Z 2008-03-21T18:40:05Z tag:www.planetbods.org,2008:/blog//2.780

Recently finding the BBC mailing list subscription page I coded in 2001, reminded me of another blog post I've been meaning to write. Some time ago, I telneted in to one of the internal web servers at work where I had my own webspace years ago and which I occasionally still use for various bits and pieces. A lot of my old code is still there, mostly templates for long defunct CGI scripts. However one particular page caught my eye.

Andrew Bowden 2008-03-18T14:58:18Z 2008-03-18T14:29:37Z tag:www.planetbods.org,2008:/blog//2.779

It's coming up for five years since I coded my last web page for the BBC, and very little of my work remains. This is probably a good thing given the code isn't exactly what people these days would be impressed by.

Andrew Bowden 2008-03-05T15:55:35Z 2008-03-02T16:24:25Z tag:www.planetbods.org,2008:/blog//2.775

Whilst sitting down to a nice, homemade green Thai curry last night, we happened to catch the second half of "Eurovision: Your Decision" last night which meant I got to see a strange woman in a corset and an extremely short skirt, Michelle Gayle and Andy Abraham battle it out in front of Terry Wogan sat on a throne in a programme format which was clearly designed to try and stop the UK public from voting for some diabolical crap again.

Andrew Bowden 2008-02-26T12:50:26Z 2008-02-26T11:07:33Z tag:www.planetbods.org,2008:/blog//2.772

Blogs for me are a great way for the BBC to communicate with the people who use, and pay for, its services and it's great that they've been a success. Indeed, probably too much of a success if the continuing comment problems are anything to go by. The problems in trying to put up a single comment are, frankly, terrible. Timeouts... Server problems... You're not even sure if your comment has even got through to the server backend half the time.

Andrew Bowden 2008-02-11T13:26:48Z 2008-02-11T13:27:02Z tag:www.planetbods.org,2008:/blog//2.766

There's a piece in the Daily Mirror today, in outrage about the fact that apparently (and there's no source quoted, so who knows how true this is)...

Andrew Bowden 2007-12-19T10:42:36Z 2007-12-19T19:49:15Z tag:www.planetbods.org,2007:/blog//2.745

Anyone reading the BBC Internet Blog will have noticed a flurry of posts celebrating the 10th aniversary of bbc.co.uk. All the reminiscing has, to be honest, got me reminising about my old memories of working on the BBC website

Andrew Bowden 2007-12-20T10:14:46Z 2007-12-19T14:10:22Z tag:www.planetbods.org,2007:/blog//2.746

On Tuesday, the front page of the BBC staff newspaper, Ariel, was devoted to the relocation package on offer for staff affected by the BBC's move to Salford. Basically it's quite a good package in some respects, mainly because the one thing the BBC is not going to want to do is start several departments completely from scratch when they move them from the glamorous world of London's W12.

Andrew Bowden 2007-12-11T15:56:13Z 2007-12-11T12:22:57Z tag:www.planetbods.org,2007:/blog//2.741

Lots of people have blogged about it - with comments ranging from celebrating about the lack of the bbc.co.uk logo, and celebrating that lovely retro clock. So here's my bit.

Andrew Bowden 2007-11-30T12:17:09Z 2007-11-30T12:15:41Z tag:www.planetbods.org,2007:/blog//2.736

It was June 2004 when the BBC's move of several departments from London to the north west was first announced. The department I worked for (and still work for) was one of those highlighted.

Andrew Bowden 2007-11-27T17:17:48Z 2007-11-27T12:23:30Z tag:www.planetbods.org,2007:/blog//2.733

With the latest series of Doctor Who getting ever closer, news is creeping out about cast and enemies. Like this little one today - according to BBC News, Billie Pipper is popping back for three more episodes.

Andrew Bowden 2007-11-06T12:32:55Z 2007-11-06T12:08:56Z tag:www.planetbods.org,2007:/blog//2.720

I'm probably paying far more attention to the whole iPlayer saga than my sanity allows, but I do find some of the comments interesting.

Andrew Bowden 2007-11-05T14:35:23Z 2007-11-05T14:08:13Z tag:www.planetbods.org,2007:/blog//2.718

There's an interesting article about complaints in the BBC staff canteens, in the Sunday Telegraph.

Andrew Bowden 2007-11-02T19:52:57Z 2007-11-02T19:48:12Z tag:www.planetbods.org,2007:/blog//2.716

Many many many many years ago (well okay two and a half years ago), I wrote something on this blog about the whole work/blog thing and how it would be nice to be able to talk about work projects on a proper, BBC hosted work blog. A proper engagement between the BBC and its audience on all sorts of things. To discuss why certain things were done the way they were. To talk about how it all fits together. To say "Whoops!" when things went wrong.

Andrew Bowden 2007-11-04T08:21:53Z 2007-10-29T22:13:51Z tag:www.planetbods.org,2007:/blog//2.713

Ever since the BBC's iPlayer's TV programme download service launched in beta format a few months ago, its use of digital rights management has been a hot topic across various parts of the internet for all sorts of reasons.

Andrew Bowden 2007-01-31T21:38:16Z 2007-01-31T21:23:23Z tag:www.planetbods.org,2007:/blog//2.658

As a GNU/Linux user myself, the thought of the BBC's iPlayer being Windows XP only, wasn't one I particularly relished. So I was particularly interested in the reports that the BBC Trust have told the BBC management that iPlayer must take a more platform agnostic approach.

Andrew Bowden 2007-02-10T17:24:48Z 2007-01-18T20:56:54Z tag:www.planetbods.org,2007:/blog//2.651

The BBC's Fifteen Web Principles

Andrew Bowden