Site Design & Development

This website is the new public-facing side of our online, digital archive system, created by the Committee and other members of the History Project. Our original site was kindly provided by BECTU (www.bectu.org.uk), and served us well for many years. However, as the size of our unique collection and the needs of our users requiring access, continued to grow, it became evident that the site would need to be developed separately and independently. 

Our new website now uses a lightweight, data collection management model, developed by Alison Bancroft and Ian Noah, who used Drupal open source software to provide a new lightweight data collection and access model for cultural organisations. The software solution is designed to be flexible and customisable, so that the website can be hosted anywhere, according to client requirements; the media assets can be stored separately in the client's own chosen location; and the whole system can be managed and customised by anyone in the open source community, familiar with Drupal and Twitter Bootstrap. 

Whilst created to meet the specific requirements of the History Project, the site also has the capacity to host interviews from other partner organisations or oral history projects seeking similar solutions for digital archiving and improving public access. Furthermore, any project or organisation wishing to adapt or host their own version of our website, can do so, by using our developed software solution, free of charge.

For further information please contact us.

N.B. Please note that this site is currently in Beta. This means that though the site is available for public use, it is still undergoing live development and subject to change. You may therefore see content which is in draft, being edited or being tested for feedback. ​We encourage all users to feel free to provide suggestions and feedback, via our Contact page.