Slow progress...

Just thought I'd say Happy New Year to all you lot out there, and explain a little about why progress has slowed a little on the site. I'm now working for Green Thing, managing their website, so naturally the Carbon Diet has had to take a bit of a back seat. However, it's still going, just at a slower pace.

I've been sorting out a few new features over the last little while, and I'm nearly ready to release what I'm going to call version 1, finally! There is still plenty to do after that though, so I'll be busy for a while! Hopefully, soon I'll be announcing some interesting news regarding the site and how it's going to go forward, so keep your eyes peeled, ears to the ground, etc etc.

Long haul

I've just completed my the Carbon Diet version 0.9. It's been a whole month since 0.8 was completed, so this one has taken quite a while. I've been uploading the changes as I've been making them, so there aren't actually any major new features to announce right now; this is just a way to close off that cycle. It was mostly aimed at social features like the comment system, working avatars, league tables for your friends and groups, and so on. There were also a few major bugfixes; for instance, the email reminder system should now work properly.

Anyway, now that this iteration is complete, it's on to the next one. This one is quite exciting, because it will add the one major thing the site is missing, and which a lot of people have been asking for - air travel! Watch this space, there will be something to play with very soon!

Notes

I've just added a note function to the site. You can make notes which are attached to particular dates, and which show up on the daily graph, so you can see when you did certain things. For example, if you turn your heating down, you might add a note to remind you when you did it, so that you can see on the graph what difference it makes. You can attach notes to any of your accounts, or generally to your profile as a whole.

Notes brings the cycle of work for version 0.8 to a close, which is a relief for me! This iteration took a little longer than planned, but that's mainly because I kept adding things to it! The main features in the next version will be flights (hopefully), user and group comments, and aggregate statistics for friend lists and groups. Should be fun!

Version 0.3 and beyond...

Version 0.3 of the Carbon Diet website has just been uploaded for your delectation. This version builds on the existing functionality, adding the ability to track mains natural gas usage. There are also some layout changes, a bit more explanation text in some places, and a bunch of bugfixes and efficiency improvements.

Now that you can track more than one source, you can compare them side by side and see which is dominant. If, for instance, your emissions from gas are higher than electricity, you might want to look at ways of reducing that one first, such as turning down the thermostat a little, or investing in a more efficient boiler or solar water heating system. The possibilities are endless, and now, the Carbon Diet gives you the information you need to make the right decisions!

Now it's time to start work on the next version, which will add the final major piece of emission tracking functionality - vehicle fuel! There will be more later, such as tanked oil and gas, but they will come after the public release.

The complete plan is this: version 0.4 will include vehicle fuel tracking, as well as functionality which allows you to attach notes to dates. Version 0.5 will then add the social aspects, with public profile information, blog and web page widgets, league tables, and so on. At that point, it'll be mainly tidying up, working on the design, and rewriting text for version 1.0, which will be released to the world properly.

After that, I'll be working on support for flights, other fuel sources such as heating oil, tanked gas, and so on, as well as proper graph customisation options. That's all a little way in the future though, we shall see how it goes I guess...