Most regular DesignCrowd users would agree, we have come a long way. It's taken time but we are now in a position where we can confidently say: not only do we have a brilliant product but we also have a brilliant platform to support it. We rarely focus on the technology side of the site but in today's blog we wanted to touch on some of the technical developments and issues we are currently facing and how we are looking to address them going forward. 

As some of you may be noticing, the site has recently gone through a number of changes as we begin to lay the foundations for new and exciting product areas on DesignCrowd. As a result, we have experienced a number of unplanned outages due to installation of important fixes to the server and addressing issues in regards to server capacity and performance. 

What does this mean from a users point of view? Well it just means that in the short-term you may be noticing further website updates (and the occasional "oops page") as we continue to roll out of a number of improvements to the site. Most of these short-term improvements to our platform will look to address site capacity issues and enhancements to the existing performance and security of the site.  

A few technical things to look out for: 

  • Minimum browser requirements: As we begin to offer more advanced features we are going to have to likely drop support for some of the "ancient" browser versions. Don't be too concerned though, we understand that there is a large diversity in browser types so we are going to try and support as many as possible.
  • Planned Outage Windows: we will start notifying the community of any major planned server outages on our site. Most of these will be posted via blog postings, newsletters or notices we might put up around the site. 
  • Performance and security: in an effort to make this site as fast and robust as possible, we are continually rolling out new features which will ensure your DesignCrowd security and performance is world class. 

Lastly, we would like to personally thank all community members who have actively reported issues on the site as well as recommended new features. Whilst not all these new features have been addressed, I assure you they are a high priority on our list and will be implemented in the near future.I invite you to post comments below on your thoughts on our DesignCrowd technical plans going forward. 

Thanks again and enjoy the site.

Written by DesignCrowd on Wednesday, January 27, 2010

DesignCrowd is an online marketplace providing logo, website, print and graphic design services by providing access to freelance graphic designers and design studios around the world.