Pacific NW Portal Early August Update Launches

It's only been two weeks since the relaunch of Pacific Northwest Portal and the debut of Version 3.0.

Snce that time, though, the Portal team has put together a small package of improvements that we're releasing as an update to the Portal. If you're familar with our history, you know that our bread and butter is frequent updates to our website.

So, without further grandstanding, here's an overview of the update we released today: (For anyone who is actually taking notes - we're now on Version 3.1, OK?)

• New Air America Stations Graphic. At the top of every web page, there's a clean, soft, and and clearer listing of the major Air America affiliates in the Pacific Northwest. It used to just be text before...but now, it's a graphic.
• Improved National News Wire. It moved too slowly, had duplicates, and was Associated Press only. No longer. The improved national news wire has been released - the first time we've changed it since last March. You'll notice news stories will move through much faster - and there should be no duplicate stories.
• New Page Footers. The link tree has been improved...so you can access any Portal page from the footer link tree, including the utility that lets you easily set Pacific Northwest Portal as your homepage.
• Syndicate Changes. We have rules for our syndicated blogs - and one of the most important is staying updated. Two bloggers in our Expanded Oregon section have let their blogs grow somewhat stagnant over the last few weeks...so those blogs have now moved solely to the directory. We are pleased to announce that Middle Earth Journal and The Grumpy Forester are joining the syndicate as their replacements.
• Toolkit Page Revamped. This page has many of the most important changes in this update. The new Toolkit page has a new traffic camera for Boise and direct links to urban traffic maps for the Seattle, Portland, and Boise metro areas - so you can get a better understanding of your commute. We are proud to announce that we are now an officially approved partner of AccuWeather, Inc. - so we've revamped the "Weather Conditions" section of the page with a new, reliable live radar map and a weather forecast lookup by zip code, courtesy of AccuWeather.
• Blogs & Websites Directory Update. Ten new blogs have been added, bringing our grand total to a hundred and sixty six blogs - hard to believe that we've gone from under fifty to begin with, to growing beyond three times that number, in just a few months.
• Highlights Page Update. We brought it up to date with the times - you can find the latest highlights from around the region there.
• Feedback Page Update. You'll notice it now has a graphic commemorating our win yesterday as the Seattle Weekly's "Best Local Website" for the 2005 Best of Seattle Contest.

That's essentially the extent of the changes - not a huge rollout, but we've done what we believe we need to do to keep this site in great shape. As always, we want to know what you think of the changes - send us your feedback.