History.uk.com is the world’s largest directory of British history. A free to use resource with more than 28,000 people and places connected to British history, the web site is designed to be useful to anyone with an interest in history.
The Business Requirement
History.uk.com required a website that would provide easy to use access to a vast resource of historical information about the U.K. With entries covering all notable events in British history and over 28,000 listings for sites of historical interest, the site had to be easy to navigate and search. For the end-user, the company wanted a site that would be usable by everyone from amateur historians, teachers and students through to tourists, parents and anyone with just a passing interest in history. For the site administrators, they wanted a fast and simple interface allowing them to add new entries and listings, and keep existing ones up-to-date.
The Sigmer Solution
Sigmer decided a database-driven approach was the best solution for History.uk.com. This would allow the site to serve a large amount of data without having an unmaintainable number of web pages, and enabled Sigmer to write a flexible, fast and thorough search engine for the site. Future redesigns of the site would be simple to implement, as the data need only be served using a different template.
Similarly, by storing the information in a database, the task of finding and editing content was greatly simplified for the site administrators, through a set of user-friendly PHP scripts tailor-made for History.uk.com's needs by Sigmer.
The Result
The site now attracts more than 20,000 unique visitors each month. Since its launch in September 2002, History.uk.com has been widely praised and commended as a valuable resource. The company is currently working with a number of key organisations including HM Tower of London, The National Trust for Scotland and the Society of Genealogists.
Ray Hatley, Managing Director of History.uk.com:
“We chose to work with Sigmer Technologies because we were impressed by their expertise in database-driven websites. Their developers have in-depth knowledge of how best to build sites from just an initial concept. They were able to create a fast and reliable site which presents our information in exactly the way we chose.”
