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IanP
August 16th, 2015, 04:53
Hello folks,

I should probably post this over here, too, as I know a number of people on SOH use my airfields.

Unfortunately, due to my losing my job and the British Government being determined to drag their heels as much as possible on telling me what I can or cannot do next, it looks like we're going to have to cancel our internet connection at the end of September. When I do so, I'll have to take down my website, too, because the older version of Drupal that I'm using to run it needs constant updates to protect it from the ever-present bots that would really quite like to take it over for their authors' ends rather than ours!

As a result, if you don't have any of my airfields, now's the time to grab them, before I have to shut things down. I retain some hope that another agency that I'm waiting for a response from will at least delay, if not prevent, this needing to be done, but as I can't guarantee it, I'd rather anyone who wants the files that are on there gets them before I hit the "maintenance mode" button and lock everything down to secure it.

While I do ask that they aren't uploaded to other file download sites, I have no objection at all to anyone sending them around privately if someone asks and can't find them.

http://www.ianpsdarkcorner.co.uk

Cheers,

Ian P.

Roger
August 16th, 2015, 05:02
Well first Ian, let me say I'm very sorry to hear that you've lost your job...I know what that feels like!

Anyone who uses Ian's scenery who hasn't donated yet please do so (that includes me!).

I'll be downloading the ones I don't have yet.

jeansy
August 16th, 2015, 05:33
Sorry to hear, I hope things work out and you get your second wind

Would it be too much if OZx host your airports?

rich12545
August 16th, 2015, 05:34
I'm sorry to hear about your problems. Is there any reason you don't want to post your airfields in the SOH library or maybe Flightsim or Avsim?

Roger
August 16th, 2015, 05:45
Donation made.

trucker17
August 16th, 2015, 07:35
That is such sad news Ian.
I really hope all works well with you and that something falls in line to help you.
Thanks for the sceneries and all the help you have been to me with scenery design.
Craig.

txnetcop
August 16th, 2015, 07:45
I can relate Amigo...the company I worked for was bought out and I had to let my whole crew go before they let me go. At 65 you aren't exactly in demand but there is always a way. Hang tough Ian...something will come up. I will wait until I can donate to the cause before I take any more for the airfields you do so masterfully...
Ted

YoYo
August 16th, 2015, 08:15
Is it possible to upload Your work on FlighSim or Avsim?
Im user of Your scenery from many years... :wavey:, sad news! : <

Sundog
August 16th, 2015, 08:28
Grabbed some airfields and made a donation. Hang in there Ian!

Boomer
August 16th, 2015, 09:10
Terrible news Ian, so sorry to hear of your situation! I know things seem grim but keep your chin up. I have had the same thing happen to me twice & on both occasions I ended up better off because of the job loss. It opened opportunities that I had never considered.

When one door closes another always opens. Be watching for it!

IanP
August 16th, 2015, 09:47
Thanks guys.

The problem is that I lost my job directly due to a long-standing back injury, which having been sacked from a rock-standard office job makes me now effectively unemployable. The only person who's likely to want to employ me is me and I'm currently signed off as being incapable of working anyway. That's why I'm waiting for the Government to decide whether I'm going to be put into the "support" pile of people, or the "work" pile of people. Apparently this will be some time in April or May next year. :banghead::dizzy:

They're experts at dragging it out to the 'n'th degree, in the hope that I'll keel over with a heart attack or something (more likely a stroke due to increased blood pressure!) before they have to actually make a decision. In the meantime, even if I wanted to work, it's illegal for me to do so, because if I do, then I should never have been in this situation in the first place and am guilty of fraud... Silly system. Or more accurately silly politicians making silly decisions to create a silly system.

Anyway. The reason I don't upload my files to a website is that I never stop fiddling with them. I'm currently in the process of trying to add SODE controlled models to them all and replace the vehicles with the newer, better looking, ones. I will keep doing that for as long as I have a computer and electricity, so that once all these various farces are resolved, I will be closer to the end I want, which is not needing to use anyone's library files but my own. It's a nice idea, right? ;)

Because I'm constantly tweaking and fiddling with the files, it becomes impossible to maintain them on a site that I don't have control of. The major sites get really annoyed if you keep patching or updating files and just say no.

I'll look into whether I can get someone else to maintain my site. If I can't, then I'll see whether someone else can host the files while I'm offline, but I can't put them on Avsim, FS.com or anywhere similar if I want to continue improving them.

Edited to add: Ted (and anyone else!) - I'm not asking for people to give me money, I'm just trying to say to advise people that they might want to grab the files which are, and will remain, freeware. If people choose to donate then we are very grateful, but certainly there's no need to do so before downloading files... Grab them quick! :)

Cheers,

Ian P.

trucker17
August 16th, 2015, 09:52
Heres to keeping fingers crossed, that they (The Government) finds a gear other then Granny gear to work in.
Here in the U.S. they are the same....I think both governments are using the same playbook......:banghead::banghead:

ian elliot
August 16th, 2015, 10:02
Hi Ian, bad news, hope everything works out for you,
I was thinking of the third party objects you host, mainly Ted Andrews, i know Teds stuff is available at the big download sites but its a bit of a minefield finding the right file's, you've managed to coral all the texture's and bgl's into one handy folder that can be activated in the scenery library, i use them a lot in my scenerys and a few others on this forum do also, maybe they could be hosted at the Outhouse,

cheers ian

Cees Donker
August 16th, 2015, 10:21
Sorry to learn this is happening Ian. Let me know ifI can help!

:kilroy:

Cees

Bjoern
August 16th, 2015, 10:28
You could migrate your files to Google Drive or MS's SkyDrive. I know the former has a revision management system which is really useful.


As for whining about governments:
Public broadcasting fee. Don't own a TV or radio? Don't make use of streaming media from public stations? Too bad, you still have to pay a ridiculous sum month after month. Refuse to pay? Well, let's just charge an even more ridiculous penalty fee. Want to sue? Not gonna work, buddy, it's the law! Need an exemption? Yeah, we'll just delay everything so you can pay later. I hope they choke on the 250€ I was forced to pay for a year's worth of refusal.

trucker17
August 16th, 2015, 10:35
LOL....
I hear that one.....

fsafranek
August 16th, 2015, 11:36
You could migrate your files to Google Drive or MS's SkyDrive. I know the former has a revision management system which is really useful.
(Sorry Bjoern, for some reason the forum doesn't want to let me reply with a quote today so having to manually do so.)

Ian, sorry about your situation. Have been there a couple of times. Sucks big time. But it does force you to prioritize things and FS might not fit in there for a while. But of source it is a good escape from time to time.

As Bjoern suggested, you can put your files up on a server that only hosts files. THEN, since you have a lot of description on your current website, start a blog with your descriptions and links back to the files.

txnetcop
August 16th, 2015, 12:31
Edited to add: Ted (and anyone else!) - I'm not asking for people to give me money, I'm just trying to say to advise people that they might want to grab the files which are, and will remain, freeware. If people choose to donate then we are very grateful, but certainly there's no need to do so before downloading files... Grab them quick! :)

Cheers,

Ian P.

Don't worry Ian I didn't take it that you were asking for money and I don't think anyone else would feel that way either. You do great work and hey when hard times come it's nice to know folks have your back!
Ted

Roger
August 16th, 2015, 12:52
Edited to add: Ted (and anyone else!) - I'm not asking for people to give me money, I'm just trying to say to advise people that they might want to grab the files which are, and will remain, freeware. If people choose to donate then we are very grateful, but certainly there's no need to do so before downloading files... Grab them quick! :)

Cheers,

Ian P.


Well Ian,

I hope you don't mind that I donated. It was instinctive and I'm sorry if that annoyed you.

trucker17
August 16th, 2015, 12:56
I did'nt take it that way either.
And just for the record.....His sceneries are payware QUALITY.:encouragement::encouragement::encourageme nt:

Mickey D
August 16th, 2015, 13:39
Ian. Although you are not asking for monetary help I see no reason why this community shouldn't come to your financial assistance. After all "crowd funding" has helped others in the very recent past who were in a less serious position than yourself. So don't feel bad if we rally round in your time of need.

Come on now you guys I'm off to donate.

OK I got Ian's library objects and donated on behalf of Team SDB (hopefully he'll let me use his ambulance ;) ). How about the rest of you?

Bjoern
August 16th, 2015, 15:37
(Sorry Bjoern, for some reason the forum doesn't want to let me reply with a quote today so having to manually do so.)

Don't worry, I sometimes get that, too.


As Bjoern suggested, you can put your files up on a server that only hosts files. THEN, since you have a lot of description on your current website, start a blog with your descriptions and links back to the files.

I know that Dino uses a blog to promote his stuff, but I find such things a bit hard to follow. One of those free "throw a website together within 5 minutes" things might be of more use.

Double J
August 16th, 2015, 17:29
Good luck to you and your family. Hard working Canadians are in the same boat as my wife and I will lose everything we worked for come Oct19th as Canada will becom Communist/NDP. Can I plead refugee status in the USA?

IanP
August 17th, 2015, 01:09
Roger: Certainly no offence taken, as I said, we're really grateful. I just don't want people to feel compelled to send money. Personally, I'd rather find a method of making it myself, but, well, see above. I need Skype's new burning head emoticon every time I think about the DWP right now.

Mickey D: Which one? The RAF never actually used the K2Y during the war (slap Airfix as necessary) except for one unit based in the Middle East that wasn't actually airfield based. The Albion AM463 is the right truck, as it entered service before the war and stayed there throughout, but I'm not 100% sure on the colour scheme. I'll reply by PM to talk trucks... Half tempted to say that you can use them in return for a copy of the airfields that they're on, but that might upset someone else who wants to use them as well. ;)

Hosting the website isn't the problem - that's paid for for two years, by which point hopefully this will all be sorted out. The problem is that the version of Drupal I use is old and needs constant updates to keep secure. Since bringing this up, I've had a few good ideas for how we can resolve that from various people. My preferred one is transferring it to a WordPress platform that can be updated remotely, without need for a fast FTP connection, but that means we need to create a template and transfer everything on to it. My current Drupal installation, unfortunately, needs the files to be downloaded, extracted, then manually uploaded to my host every time it gets a security fix, which seems to be never ending.

Cheers,

Ian P.

JensOle
August 17th, 2015, 10:54
IanP,

Sorry to hear about your situation.

I just wanted to write to say that your sceneries have been favourites for a long time. Your web page is a treasure of w.w. 2 airfields for FS! Thank you for your time and effort to the hobby!

Take care!

Francois
August 17th, 2015, 11:29
Hi Ian, ony saw this now and I am not on Skype much anymore.....

since I host webspaces/websites..... I'd be happy to let you have one...... no cost, no involvement, you run it. Just let me know

Francois

trucker17
August 17th, 2015, 19:18
Way to step up Francois.
You have never let anyone down. Now lets go Ian. Lets get Iansdarkcorner to a safe location.

BTW Ian. Dont you have WIFI Hotspots over their you can use from time to time when needed.

IanP
September 18th, 2015, 05:37
Hi folks.

Well, I have some good news. One back payment has come in and we're due to receive another one which, between the two of them, will secure our finances for a couple of months - probably until Christmas, which buys us a considerable amount more time to sort this mess out.

There's now a Wordpress installation lurking in the background of my site, while I work out the best way of porting everything over into it. Given the amount of changes that we need to make and things that don't have proper pages up anyway, I'll probably enlist Mrs. P's assistance and we'll recreate the site from scratch, rather than trying to port the database, which seems to be extremely hit and miss to do yourself, or expensive to get done for you. Therefore it'll be a while before anything looks different, but fingers crossed, I can get it stable (and self-updating!) on a WordPress platform before our next crisis!

Thanks very much to all those who helped out and offered their support, it's very greatly appreciated.

Cheers,

Ian P.

spatialpro
September 18th, 2015, 06:15
I'm really glad people paid up Ian! Here is hoping more do the same...

Andy