CURRENT  UNDERTAKINGS

Apologies to everybody who has been sending me Emails, but once again the "Christmas PC bug" that I seem to get every year, has struck again. This time it was a fried memory card. I promise to reply to them ASAP. Hopefully, I haven't lost any during my reformatting that I decided to execute.

I've been struggling to get the PC back to a better condition from whence it came. I've had a lot of success and it's now working a lot faster and there's less clutter.

I hope you are enjoying the Solomon Knight story, and now that I've got the scanner working again, I'll get to work on some of the 'olde' comics.

Laters

Al - 13th December 2006

There appears to be a real problem with getting the Forum to send automatic Emails and Personal Messages (PM's). I've put on my deerstalker and done some investigating and believe the problem potentially lies with my hosts Email setup (not 100% certain though). So I have sent him an Email with all the problems that I have been experiencing and am awaiting his reply.

I've also had some wonderful news from D.C.Thomson and have their permission to display pages from some of their comics. I'll be starting with the excellent Tales From Solomon Knight from Bullet and will be following that up with Union Jack Jackson from Warlord. I'm really very, very pleased with this arrangement .

My new job is going very well (thank you) but I still need to complete a few projects before I continue work on Comics UK V2. Really very annoying, but I've promised myself, NO MORE NEW PROJECTS UNTIL V2 IS UP AND RUNNING.

Laters

Al - 27th October 2006

I am experiencing some really serious ISP issues lately. The intermittent windows of opportunity are still persisting with NTL: Telewest. Their explaination being, "There is a problem in your area, and it will be resolved ASAP." Well, thank you NTL. It was fine when Telewest were at the helm.

So I will take this opportunity to say that I will be on holiday for a fortnight and will return on the 10th September 2006. I have put a piece of code in place that will attempt to upload all the images for the rest of the New World For Old story (pages 8-18) on a daily basis. When I return, there will be strips from a 1904 Comic Cuts issue plus Leo Baxendale's The Kids of Stalag 41 from the excellent Jet comic from the early 70's. Click here for a taster of Leo's strip.

Also, many thanks to all the people that have send me images of comics, annuals and specials over the past few weeks. They will get uploaded after I return from my hols. Also, thank you to Mike Brady who has given me a lot of MySQL advice, which will greatly assist Comics UK V2.

Speak to you in a fortnights time (if NTL have sorted out my connection problem that is).

Best regards,

Al - 26th August 2006

My Internet Service Provider (NTL: Telewest) have confirmed there is a problem with my connection. It is extremely intermittent and really, really frustrating. I will also be going on my holiday from 26th August 2006 for two weeks, so maybe the problem will be resolved by then!! Al (25th August 2006)

Am having very serious problems with my Internet connection at the moment. I'm experiencing extremely slow response. So slow in fact, that my Dreamweaver connection is constantly timing out as it's trying to connect to the server. Please bear with me and my very poor connection - Al (24th August 2006)

Hi All. Apologies for the down time during the past 24 hours, but the 'cranky' old Access databases that are currently behind many of the sections of this site appear to be the culprits. The sooner I convert over to MySQL the better, me thinks.

I've worked an heavy-duty shift pattern over the past 9 days (108 hours to be precise), so I haven't had much time to work on Comics UK V2. But every spare moment will be devoted to it, as already promised.

I sincerely appreciate all the supportive and helpful Emails that some of you guys have sent me. They were most welcome.

Speak soon

Al - 13th August 2006

As much as my new job is making me work more hours than I actually thought existed in a normal week (i.e. 60 hours last week), I've managed to find a bit of time to work on Version 2 of the Comics UK website. It's extremely early days yet, but I have managed to write my first few pages using CSS, PHP and MySQL. A minor achievement for yours truly, and these applications are what I would like to write the whole site it. Basically, just to see if I can, plus they are the "new and groovy" flavours of the moment.

Obviously, there's still a very long way to go, but the foundations have been laid and I'm getting quite excited (in a coding kinda way) about the new look, new features and revamping of the old features. Yep, I'll be converting absolutely everything from the current version to the new version. It's going to be a massive overhaul, but I think you'll like it when its finished. I'll be aiming to get something meaningful in place by Christmas (but I ain't gonna tell you which year ).

I've also got to find a new story to scan in for the Daily Page section yet. A trip to my attic is about to be embarked upon.

Speak to you soon,

Al - 18th July 2006

YIPPEE!!! Comics UK is back

A billion apologies for the latest self-inflicted wounds that have resulted in Comics UK being down for 11 blinking days!!

I won't dwell too much on it, except to say that I've learnt a valuable lesson. Don't mess around with things that may affect other people if you think you're gonna get it wrong!!

But you might also like to know that I do now have split partitions on my hard drive with both Vista and XP Pro on them and I also know that I'd better upgrade my databases from Access to MySQL or the same problems may arise again (this will come with Comics UK version 2.0 - 'onest guv).

Of course, with these 11 days offline the Daily Page story Adare's Anglians will be the Daily 2 pages until this story concludes. You may have noticed that I've removed the old comic link temporarily. As much as I would like to have the Adare's Anglians story finish on the 9th July (World Cup Final day), that would mean 4-5 pages getting uploaded each day. Just a little too many me thinks.

Many, many thanks to all the people that have emailed me (and Forum'ed me) with advice on how to get out of the pickle I had put myself in. It was really very much appreciated and warmly received.

I'd also like to thank The Hornet (Forum member) for scanning in the pages of one of the issues of the Adare's Anglians story that I was missing. This means that I am missing just the ONE issue now. So if you think you may have the Jet comic dated the 18th September 1971, please look for it. And if you've got access to a scanner, please scan it in and email the pages to me.

Once again, many apologies and it's nice to be back.

Al - 26th June 2006

I've just noticed that the above drop down panel is working fine, so the problem is not as bad as first thought. Watch this space!!!

Al - 25th June 2006

As you may be aware, I've have some serious issues with my PC over the past week and am still getting it back to something approaching normality. With this problem seemingly being resolved I was going to continue uploading pages for the Adare's Anglians when I was confronted with the currently outstanding problem. Basically, a problem with the database. To make matters slightly worse, I will be working all weekend (including during the England game) so my hands are tied at the moment.

However, I do have a free day on Monday (26th June 2006) and I have decided to convert all the databases from Access to SQL, in the hope that this will resolve the problem. If not, then I may call upon Captain Hurricane to sort things out.

I do apologise for this, but you know what computers are like. One minute thry're working fine, next minute, something that's been working perfectly well for 5 years decides to be tempermental. Hmmmmmph!

I hope, and I do stress the word hope, to have the problem resolved by Tuesday, but I'm sure there'll be something waiting round the coding corner to bite me in the rear.

Al - 25th June 2006

I've added a few more 'contributed' covers for Annuals, Specials and the Gallery section - Thanks to Daniel Lott and Steve Saunders.

There are also some wonderfully concise overviews of two Buster stories. Namely Fishboy and Galaxus - written by Roger Clarke who's doing these from memory - incredible. These stories can be found within the Comics option --> Buster --> Characters & Stories.

Of course, if you've got your cookies switched on, you can use the Checkpoint Area option to see what has been updated since your last visit. Of course, you would have had to have gone into this section once before so that the original cookie could be written.

I am looking into the PM problem on the Forum. It seems weird how I can successfully send and receive PM's to everyone, while others are finding problems. Computers eh!

More soon

Al - 5th June 2006

You may have noticed a delay with the Daily Page section recently. This was due to an email I received from an IPC Media representative. It scared the bejeezus out of me, because it asked for many of the stories in the Full Strip and Daily Page sections to be removed because of copyright infringements.

Of course, they were perfectly correct in what they were asking. Even though Comics UK is a non-profit making site, the law is the law. The main concern was the hi-res quality of all the pages from these two sections.

Although all of us just read the stories on a daily basis, there are some unscrupulous people out there who would think nothing of lifting all the images, placing them on a CD and selling them on via eBay or some other outlet. And I can speak from personal experience on this front because it has already happened to Comics UK.

I must say, that the chap from IPC Media that sent the Email was very approachable and we came to a compromise. I will convert all the images from hi-res to lo-res and also include an IPC watermark on each page, plus a courtesy statement. Hopefully, this will not be too encumbering while you're reading them.

I've had to finally learn some Photoshop techniques in order to create the watermark effect, plus I am now learning how to use a piece of software that will place these watermarks in batch form. Which means that I will be able to update more than one page at a time. I've still got to learn how to place text within a Photoshop layer, but I've got no work today, so I know what I will be doing.

This new process will occur from now on and I will start altering all the pages which have gone before. The OLD comic strip will be in place from tomorrow. It is going to be an old 1901 Funny Wonder from the Amalgamated Press.

Al - 2nd June 2006

There is currently a copyright issue with IPC Media who are being very supportive of this website I'm happy to say. This is the reason why there hasn't been any new OLD comic strips in the Daily Page section for the past couple of days. This will hopefully be resolved very shortly and I will relay the whole story to you. Until then, please bear with me.

Al - 31st May 2006

I'm pleased to say that I have now got a job that, although won't make me a millionaire over night, will pay the bills.

I've also been very busy in setting up a small web-developement buisness with my son and am still learning PHP and MySQL. The new version of Comics UK will be solely built using these two technologies and Adobe Flash. But as always when you're trying to juggle work, learning and hobbies, development of websites becomes a slow process - sorry!

Speak soon

Al - 10th May 2006

I'm very pleased that everyone is enjoying the new forums and I must admit that I'm enjoying reading them all, especially the old, old posts that have been given the kiss-of-life by some of the members. I'm also pleased with the positive feedback that I'm receiving about the Daily Page section. It's very nice to read some of the strips that appeared 'within' the comic and not just the front and back pages. After the Day of the Eagle has finished, I will start the Adam Eterno - the Thunder years pages. These will be pages from the only 22 issues of that much-underrated comic from IPC, Thunder.

The next big thing that I would like to do is revamp the Page-by-Page section, but that will have to take a little back seat for the moment as I concentrate on setting up my own web-developement business - watch this space.

Have you noticed the new section within the Forum relating to UK independent comics. My knowledge of these publications is very miniscule, but I'm hoping to learn more from any of the entries posted on this forum. The Swaps forum has been incorporated into the Buying & Selling forum (sounds like a comic merger doesn't it?).

Speak soon

Al - 22nd March 2006

Comics UK is 5 years old today and by way of celebration, I've decided to bring forward the launch date of the New Forums to today and start displaying pages from the very first issue of Comic Cuts dating back to 1890 (when I was just a kid).

The new forums have had copied over to them all the posts from the 1st January 2006 to 1st March 2006 3:30 GMT. The remaining posts will be copied over on a daily basis. There and 11,516 posts to copy over and these will now be placed in the Forum called Old Posts. This task will be completed in dribs and drabs until it's complete.

I'm sure most of you are familar with this type of Forum. If not, don't worry, it's quite straight-forward to use. Just follow these instructions.

First and foremost, you need to register. This way I can administer the forums to a much higher degree, plus I know you will like all the nice functionality that the new system offers.

So, to register and get your Username and Password click on the word 'Register' which is contained in the line of options just below the Comics UK Forum logo.

This will open up an agreement form and will ask 3 questions at the end. Click on the one saying 'I agree to these terms and am over or exactly 13 years of age.'

This will open up the Registration form asking you for certain details. The first 5 questions are mandatory, the rest are optional (and can be changed once you’re registered)

Click the Submit button and you will be told that a confirmation Email is on its way to you. When you receive the email, click on the hyperlink and you will be registered.

Now you can enter the forums by clicking on the Log In option (same line as Register) and enter the Username and Password that you supplied in the Registration form.

And that’s it.

Any questions, either refer to the FAQ's or just email me. OR if I'm online, send me a PM (Personal message).

To understand more about the forums and why they've come about, read my message in the Discussion Forum, it's the very first one entitled Welcome to the new forums. Suffice to say, I hope the trolls will be no more, but if they do try to get in, I'll do my damnest to zap 'em.

Enjoy!

Al - 1st March 2006

PS - All the posts from Old Forum Fella is me. This is the only way that I could get all the posts transferred over. The original poster details are contained within each post and when the date it was actually sent.

It certainly felt good to spend a whole day working on Comics UK today. If only I could win the lotto! Anyway, back into the real world, there are two main topics of concern. The new Daily Page section and the Forums. Please read on......

DAILY PAGE

I've realised that as much as I would like to work on the new version of this website and release it in one massive 'fanfare & fireworks' ceremony, it just isn't going to happen. So, I've decided to add the new bits as-and-when I get time to write them.

The first of these is the new DAILY PAGE section where you can read something different on the site on a daily basis, as opposed to just checking out the Forum (more later). Each day you can read a page from what I consider to be a decent comic strip and more unusally, a page from a long-forgotten story paper.

I've started with issue #1 of Magnet as a way for you read to about how the chap in the Comics UK logo (Billy Bunter) was first introduced to the world. Although, once you've finished reading the whole of the first story, you'll realise that Billy was very much a support character for Harry Wharton and Frank Nugent, but things were soon to change.

Other stories from the 'old-era' will come from Sexton Blake, Gem, Scoops and the Big 5. AKA Adventure, Rover, Hotspur, Wizard and Skipper. As well as Champion and Pilot. I will also include pages from the very, very early British comics from the 1880's - 1940. The more recent comic strips will include Adam Eterno (the Thunder years), Pre-banned Action strips (like Death Game 1999 and the very short-lived Kids Rule OK) and some Scream stories from the 15 weeks that it ran.

THE FORUM

I've noticed that there's been a bit of trolling on the forum of late, and I'm not too happy about it. So. I've decided to use a 'proper' piece of open-source forum software called PHPBB. I'm sure a lot of you have either used this type or at least seen it.

The problem that concerns me most about the new system is the copying over of the 13,000+ entries that have already been posted on the current forum. I certainly do NOT want to start the new one with a 'clean slate' as it were, that would be bordering on criminal. So I've decided that the only way around this is the good ol' copy & paste method.

This method doesn't sound too difficult, but I will be also be attempting to categorise them into sub-sections like General, Comic Titles, Rumours, Artists & Writers etc. I'll keep you posted ;-) on the Forum front via this page (which is also accessible from the Home page - just under the Forum link).

Al - 14th February 2006

I am currently teaching myself PHP and MySQL skills and will be attempting to build the new Forum using just these (with a smidge of HTML and JavaScript, of course). I've also been very busy in a couple of other projects since Christmas, which has thrown a spanner in the works of updating Comics UK. But there should be a few updates happening over the coming week.

Al - 22nd January 2006

All items that appeared throughout 2005 have been moved to here.