Newest Carbon Dieter

If it's been a bit quieter than normal around here recently, there is a pretty good reason. On 4th February, my baby daughter Amelia was born. The whole family is doing well, and adjusting to the new presence around the house. However, it might be a while until I get back to coding in my spare time!

It should be interesting to see the effect on my carbon footprint ;)

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.

Version 0.10 online

I'm very pleased to announce the general release of air travel functionality. You can now calculate your climate impact from air travel and see it alongside your domestic emissions. I predict you will be surprised...

It's a real relief to have it out there! I've had air travel working for a while now for the testers, but the graphs have been a real problem, because flight emissions are literally off the charts compared to the rest. However, by changing over to amCharts, the problem is solved. Your charts are also now much more interactive and fun to play with.

This is version 0.10, and it's the last one before the full 1.0 release (at least on my list). The next release will mainly be for tidying up loose ends that have been hanging around, and fixing any major bugs that turn up.

Let me know what you think of it!

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!

Public Profile, Friends, and Groups

I've just uploaded a whiole bucketload of new features for you to play with. It's taken me a few days (hence the lack of blog updates), but now you can make your profile public, so that others can see it and compare themselves to you. You can add people to your friends list so you can keep track of them, and you can create and join groups, organised around any theme you like.

As an example, and to get you started, here is a link to my profile.

Take Action!

Today, I've made the action system public. This is a new part of the site which makes suggestions, based on your personal data, for how you could reduce those emissions. There are a bunch of suggestions in there, and if you have any ideas of your own, then if you post them in the Forum, we'll add them to the list!

The release of the action system brings version 0.7 to completion, which was my target for this week. Next week I'll be developing the bit I've been really looking forward to - the social side of the site! This will allow you to view each others profiles, share data, and generally compete to be the greenest!

The Carbon Diet goes public!

Yesterday, I uploaded the first version of the Carbon Diet that is open to the public! You don't need to be a tester any more to use it, so it's open to the world now.

Since the last blog post, there have been a whole bunch of changes. You can now enter your data in different units, with sensible defaults depending on where you live, there is a whole bunch of explanatory text to guide you through the process, and all the graphical bugs should be ironed out. I've also added support for users in the US, so we're now international!

You can also store mileage with your fuel purchases, so although the site doesn't use it to calculate CO2, we should be able to add some fuel efficiency graphs for you in the future.

Redesign

Today I've been working on a complete graphical overhaul of the site, which I've uploaded early so that I can get feedback on it. I think it's much nicer than the last one, and it shows off the new logo as well!

There are also major changes to the workflow of the site. The site should now be much easier to navigate, and more internally consistent.

There are some changes still to be made before this becomes version 0.6 final, mostly to the tour and to the textual content of the new layout, but that can be tomorrow's job.

Take a look, and let me know what you think!

EDIT: I've just realised, I forgot to re-style the login and other user management pages. I'll fix it tomorrow ;)

More Updates

Last night I uploaded version 0.5 of the site, hurrah! This version is mainly backend improvements, so it's unlikely you'll notice anything hugely different, except possibly a few improvements in the calculations used and a few cosmetic changes here and there. I've postponed the suggestion functionality a little, because there are a few things I want to get right before I write that part.

However, one interesting new feature which you can use is available - the Carbon Diet now has a mobile interface, which you can use through your phone's web browser! This should make entering data much easier as you won't have to boot up your PC just to put an electricity reading in. It still needs heavy testing, but if you want to take a look, load up http://carbondiet.org/m in your phone's web browser.

In other news, I'm now taking a short break from paid work to develop the site full-time. I'm doing a graphical redesign this week, but then I'll hopefully be removing the tester restrictions and letting anyone sign up and get dieting!

Version 0.4

Yes, that's right, I've uploaded the next version of the site today. This one has a fair amount of new stuff in it. As well as improving the workflow and look of the site, I've added the last major domestic emissions source - cars. You can now track your fuel purchases and factor your vehicle usage into your CO2 calculations. That is the most important contributors covered (as far as the site is concerned). Other sources, like heating oil and flying will be added later on after the 1.0 release.

I've also added a tour, so that you can see what the site is all about before you sign up. This is one of the things that really had to be done so that I didn't have to explain everything to every user individually. We're getting to the point now where I can start thinking about opening the site up to a wider audience... maybe after the next version :)

Incidentally, the main thing for the next version is to add CO2 reduction suggestions, so watch this space for more details soon!

Oh, and I must namecheck LibraryThing for the very nice design of their tour, which I'm afraid I've blatantly copied. LT has been a very big influence on the Carbon Diet; I've been trying to keep my design as simple and as usable as theirs. I don't think I'm there yet, but with any luck (and skill) it should be OK in the end!

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...

The Carbon Diet goes live!

Ah yes, the day has finally come! The first version of the Carbon Diet is live, online now at www.carbondiet.org! This is only the initial version, so it's quite basic, but I really should explain what it does.

Basically, the Carbon Diet is a carbon calculator on steroids. The idea is that you enter easy-to-get data, like electricity meter readings, gas readings, and vehicle fuel purchases, and the website calculates exactly what your carbon footprint is on a day-to-day basis. This gives you a much better idea of how you can cut your carbon emissions, and when you do, you can see it happening straight away!

At the moment, the site only copes with electricity readings, but I've got a feature rollout planned which should have natural gas on there shortly, followed by the rest in due course.

If you would like to become a beta tester for the site, then head on over there, sign up, and once you've gone through the confirmation process, send me an email with your details so I can activate your account!