RISE (Racing Information Services Enterprise) launched an updated national harness racing website on Monday morning, which replaced the old www.harness.org.au format with a fresh look.
While the major changes appear to be aesthetically, the most important modifications have occurred behind the scenes, with updated technologies replacing old ones that are no longer supported and which had placed major restrictions on the functionality of the site.
These changes will enable new and enhanced features to be implemented in the future.
The RISE web team has pointed out that users should be aware of the need to rotate mobile devices (such as phones and tablets) to landscape mode (by turning phone on its side) to access extra information, particularly on the fields and results page.
“This is very common in modern development for mobile optimisation and our users will quickly become used to this function,” RISE General Manager Damien Manion said.
“As mobile devices become more common, the need to recognise and respond to different screen sizes has become vital to any website. The old site had a mobile version, but it had limited functionality and hardly anyone used it. Our statistics showed that they browsed to the desktop version instead, which was never designed to be viewed on small screens,” Mr Manion added.
The new site uses adaptive display technology, which means the screen layout changes depending on the device and orientation of the device being used.
While the site has more of a mobile friendly focus, statistics show that 50 per cent of visitors are still using desktop. The challenge was to maintain functionality across all platforms.
While new features are still in the pipeline, some that are available straight away include:
- New track details page
- Live updates on the Fields pages as results are entered
- Better calendar navigation in Meeting Calendar
“This entire redesign was done in-house by RISE, there were no external resources used,” Mr Manion said.
“Meaning there was no extra cost to the industry getting this site running. It is an important step, which will enable site to expand and improve in the coming months and years, and I congratulate the web team on the work they’ve done and the generally smooth transition.
“We encourage everyone to send in feedback if they notice a problem, or if they have suggestions regarding new features that they’d like to see. There will be people who prefer the old site, which is understandable given that it had been in place since 2008, however we encourage everyone to explore and test the new site as we think that once people are used to it, they will really like it.”
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