Updated PubCon Website by, Brett Tabke on June 21, 2011

---

We’ve updated the look and functionality of our website PubCon.com, and hope that you enjoy the new layout and features that are now live.

&nbsp

There are some issues we are working through yet, but overall we hope you like the new look and feel as much as we do. The exciting part is this is just the first phase of infastructure updating. Now that we have the new platform built, it will be much easier to add content and features on into the future. Feel free to add your comments in the comment section or send us a pm webmasterworld or dm on twitter.

 

What we did:

• New logo
• Updated template for the site
• Move the old content to WordPress
• Added new speakers blog section

As many of you know, we have a large set of programs that drive PubCon behind the scenes. Over the years, we have written one major new section every year. Under the hood PubCon.com contains several major sections totally several meg of code each:

• Registration management
• Checkout, tracking, e-mailing, mailing, name tags, coupons, and accounting functions
• Exhibitor and Sponsorship Management
• Offers, leads, sign-ups, checkout, accounting, lead-tracking and support functions
• Session Management
• A surprisingly massive section with over 1MB of scripts running to create and manage sessions ; an incredible section of code ;)
• Speakers and Proposal Management
• Registrations, proposals, biographies, presentation management and coupons
• Show Management
• Speaker tents, signage and miscellaneous

In total these represent nearly 10MB of Perl code in over 400 scripts, many of which are some 600K in length.

&nbsp

That is all cool, and has helped us keep costs of our conferences to a bare minimum, but since the old html wrapper is still hard coded, it difficult to add public website features without expending a considerable amount of time and programming effort. The availability of top shelf open source software like WordPress has made switching a natural choice.

&nbsp

So this is phase one of about three phases this year. Getting the old site converted to WordPress has been an ongoing challenge. In the not-too-distant future, we plan to bring you even more exciting new features and functions for the PubCon.com website.

&nbsp

You’ll still receive the same e-mail notifications about new information as it’s posted to the conference blog and our video blog, and if you haven’t yet signed up for the blog, it’s easy to register and stay informed on the latest PubCon events and announcements.

&nbsp

We hope you enjoy the new look of PubCon.com, and look forward to seeing you at PubCon Las Vegas 2011 on November 8 – 10 at the Las Vegas Convention Center, with a full day of PubCon Masters Group training on Monday, November 7.

&nbsp

Thanks So Much For The Support,
Brett Tabke
PubCon Founder

&nbsp