Rex's Websites

 This page and its sub-menus help me keep track of my website work. I choose not to update my original website styles over time so I have a 'historical record' of where my work has evolved from.

The website links are also in the sub-menus.

Community Support

 I am Website Manager of these community sites:

MAANZ

2017 (previous manager from 2010): The Maritime Archaeological Association of New Zealand is a Wellington-based group with an international membership. The Association researches underwater man-made heritage and has a metals-conservation laboratory in which it can restore previously-lost underwater artifacts to a condition where they can be displayed in air without corroding into piles of rust in 30 seconds.

I joined the Association when I used to live in Wellington and enjoyed SCUBA diving around the coastline, particularly amongst the many local shipwreck sites.

The site was originally created in Microsoft FrontPage and is now maintained using hand-coding or with Blue Griffon - a cross-platform EPUB and WYSIWYG web page editor. The site is hosted by myHost. I do some simple lecture event updates monthly and renew the maanz.org.nz domain name annually.

 IPMS-COMS

2017: The International Plastic Modellers - COMS site is an additional website for the COMS which is used to support the club's ability to host national plastic modelling events.

The site is created in Joomla 3 and has an 'Event Booking' plugin module which is tailored to allow attendees to pre-book their plastic model competition entries.

The site is located on my poersonal website hosted by myHost and uses a sub-domain off my personal domain name.

Awarua Communications Museum

2015: The Museum is located at the site of the former NZ Post Office coastal radio station Awarua Radio ZLB. It is located at the bottom of New Zealand, halfway between Invercargill and Bluff. My interest in the Museum is because I started my working career there as a Trainee Radio Technician.

This site is created in Joomla 3 and is hosted by myHost. I do security updates, but having created the site I add very little further content. Any current activities are presented on the Museum's Facebook page. I renew the awaruamuseum.org.nz domain name annually.

Central Otago Model Society (COMS)

2012: The COMS is a group of plastic modelers and model train enthusiasts. The group has active members from around Central Otago and 'followers' around New Zealand's South Island. My personal interest is in model trains, particularly the electronics and track-work involved.

The site is static, the theme being created using the tool 'Artisteer' before that was withdrawn from the market. I now maintain the pages by hand coding as I like the theme. The site is located on my personal website hosted by myHost and uses a sub-domain off my personal domain name.

Glenside - The Halfway

2007: Glenside is a semi-rural suburb in Wellington, New Zealand where I used to live. The site belongs to the Glenside Progressive Association where it provides community support, local heritage records, and heritage gardening insights. I provide technical support and peer review of content supplied by community members. Claire Bibby is the key content creator and she does an amazing job.

This site is created in Joomla 3 and is hosted by myHost. Other 'timely' activities are presented on the Association's Facebook page. I renew the glenside.org.nz domain name annually.

 

Personal Sites

Rexedra

2022 ->: This website is currently my first adventure working with Joomla 4 CMS and its default (responsive) Cassiopeia template. The site is hosted by myHost and I have a rexedra.gen.nz domain name. I create sub-domains for some of my little self contained websites.

The current site is an update from previous versions made using Joomla 3, Joomla 2, FrontPage and flat HTML hand-code before that. It is the only site I update web-wise as it is also my training ground for learning about new web technologies.

WXTOIMG

Circa 2020: As a part of experimenting with tracking satellites and receiving satellite weather images I used the tool WXTOIMG to do all the heavy lifting. I pointed the received picture output of wxtoimg at my webhost and had myself a self-updating hands-free weather station. The site is in recess 2021 - 2023 while I sell my house and build a new one. Hopefully I can say 'I'll be back!' and it just might happen

Banny

2018: Bannockburn Heritage Trails: This is a test site I worked on for assessing the use of a website as an alternative to a paper walking trail guide.

The village of Bannockburn is located on the outskirts of Cromwell and has some significant goldfields heritage from the 1862 Central Otago gold rush days. It is a static site created using an Artisteer-based template. This was probably my first deep dive into using responsive web pages to allow the pages to render nicely on smartphones, tablets and desktops.

Budgies

2012: The Budgie Files is a static site I created using an Artisteer-based template to record pictures of birds that a friend and I had photographed while driving around Cetral Otago.

USA Diary

2001 - 2004: My USA Diary is a Kiwi perspective of living in a big country.

Wanaka

2001: A static website I made using FrontPage to record a cycle tour I did from Wanaka to Invercargill.

WDG

1998: The Wellington Dive Guide was produced as a Microsoft FrontPage static website to record dive sites, shipwrecks and sea life I had dived, visited or played with during my SCUBA diving days in Wellington. The Internet was so new in 1998 that I had put the website onto 3 1/2 inch floppy disks for my fellow divers to use. I was told in 2021 that the Wellington-based Ghost Diving New Zealand team used the WDG as their dive-site bible. How cool is that! Thanks team.

 

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