Welcome to the brand new version of my site. I've been working on this for around a year now and have made many changes to the functionality of this site. In fact, its the largest upgrade I've performed on it to date.

The first thing you'll notice is the news feed. The content comes directly from the new PHPBB forum I've added and allows me to put news items on the front page whilst still having the discussion capability the forum provides.

Also added is the new profile bar in the top-right corner of the page. This again uses PHPBB as a back-end and allows everyone to maintain one account across both the main site and the forum. Through the profile bar you can log-in/register and once logged in you can view/edit your profile, see how many private messages you have and log-out.

The navigation bar has also been given an overhaul. It now uses a different Javascript flyout menu system which allows you to choose between click to open and hover to open. The button images have been changed as well, and there is a new navigation tree below it to help quickly tell you where you are on the site and let you go back to a certain page without the need to hit the back button.

One of the biggest changes to the site though is the upgrade from XHTML1/CSS2 to HTML5/CSS3. Both the profile bar and the footer utilise CSS3 for their borders and HTML5 has been used to replace the previous Java video player. This means that the video player now instantly supports more platforms and should load quicker as there is no more need to load an external video player, instead it uses what the browser has pre-installed (although some Javascript is used to modify the controls and provide a Flash fall-back for non-HTML 5 browsers).

I've been really excited about this update for a while, and have been anxiously waiting to show it off with a public release. I still have many more upgrades planned for the site as I progress work on my game, Air Transport Manager, and browsers add support for more and more HTML 5 features.

I am also planning to create 2 more versions of the site, a stripped-down mobile version and a dedicated smartphone version, to help provide extra compatibility for the site and enhance the overall viewing experience.