August Update

25 August 2003

Our apologies for the recent downtime and problems with the web site and email. We have recently changed to a much more powerful and reliable web server and have finally completed the transfer after much trouble. If you find any more problems, please do get in touch.

November Update

17 November 2002

Sorry for the drop in updates recently. We are currently in the process of developing our next releases and the new LockedArea.com which are all huge projects. Locked Area Pro is being completely re-written to offer subscription based membership with support for unlimited member's areas with e-commerce support. The system once completed should hopefully be very impressive with a lot of new features and enhancements. Please be patient, this is a very large project and is taking some time to complete.
LockedArea.com is also being re-designed with a more user-friendly approach to the member's area, ordering system and support methods to hopefully make your use of our web site and products even more enjoyable than ever.

Server Transfer

06 April 2002

Our apologise for the recent problems with the site, we've transferred the entire site over to our new server so everything should hopefully be a lot faster now. It's a 1.4Ghz, 1Gb RAM, Linux server. Everything on the site should now be working, if you have any problems, please don't hesitate to contact us at problems@lockedarea.com.

2002 Plan

01 January 2002

We've written a brief company plan for 2002 so if you're interested in what we're hoping to do in the next year, please [OUT OF DATE LINK REMOVED].

Member's Area

23 December 2001

The member's area is now open again. Sorry about any inconvenience caused by it's closure.

Downtime

21 December 2001

Sorry about the earlier time. Burst.net router failed and they are too cheap to have a backup so the site was down for the day. All should be working now.

Problem Fixed

11 December 2001

All problems with registration should now have been fixed and the signup form is open again. The server magically stopped the script writing to the database when no elements had been chaged which was a bit odd. Anyway, all is well now.

Signup Disabled

11 December 2001

We've temporarily shut down our signup form to fix a few recent problems. It appears our database has locked up and become unusable. We should be accepting new registrations within a few hours. This problem is not likely to occur with any distributed versions of Locked Area, we run an alpha and very highly modified version of Locked Area Enterprise which is not yet available for distribution.

Update

06 December 2001

Sorry you havn't heard from us for a while. We've been working very hard on a few new projects for you. Firstly, payments modules for Locked Area Pro should be available within a few weeks. At present we are working on payment modules for iBill, Authorize.net, PayPal and WorldPay though if you have any other suggestions please let us know. We've also been working on the next version of Locked Area Pro. Sorry, no planned release date yet, but we can promise the next release will be very different and hopefully quite impressive.

New Logo

27 November 2001

LockedArea.com has a brand new logo thanks to Chris Pim of Nexus Images. If you're using Locked Area on your site, please only use the old logo that is distributed with the script and not the new one.

Competition

13 November 2001

You can win $100 just by designing us a web site design. Please see [OUT OF DATE LINK REMOVED] for more information.

Pro Users

13 November 2001

Just to let you know that yesterday a bug was reported concerning the suspend/unsuspend users function. It's not a drastic problem but it has now been fixed. To get your copy of the updated admin script, please email pro@lockedarea.com. That should now be all the known bugs removed though if you do find any more please don't hesitate to contact us.

Donation Page

29 October 2001

After requests from several users, we've now added a donations page to the web site so visitors can donate to LockedArea.com to help support us. This is a great way to say thank you if you like Locked Area Lite or any of our other scripts. Please see [OUT OF DATE LINK REMOVED] for more information.

New Script

27 October 2001

We've released a new free password protection script called DirectoryPass. Please see http://www.directorypass.com/ [URL UPDATED] for more information.

Pro v2.0 Released

23 October 2001

Well, we've finally done it and release Locked Area Pro v2.0 with a whole list of exciting new features. Please have a look at http://www.locked-area.com/pro_features.php [URL UPDATED] for more information.

Lite v2.7 Released

23 October 2001

Just a maintenance release removing a couple of bugs. It's probably not worth updating if you're already using Locked Area Lite v2.6. It removes the image bugs and stops the use of

Locked Area Pro

22 October 2001

Well, we're almost done. We've got one last bug to iron out of Locked Area Pro and it will be ready for distribution. We've even written a manual to go with it. Though not quite complete, the installation and configutation parts are completely finished!
We're now waiting for the go ahead from our credit card processor and we should be able to start selling again.
We've also finished the new Pro member's area. It's not completely finished, but the general basis is their!
So, keep an eye out later tomorrow (23rd) and you should see Locked Area Pro.

Pro v2.0 2nd Beta

14 October 2001

We have a new version of Locked Area Pro v2.0 Beta. All previously known bugs should now have been removed. If you're a Locked Area Pro member/licensed user and would like to beta test the new version, please email [OUT OF DATE LINK REMOVED]. This version is thought to be stable but does require some final testing before official release.

News Update

13 October 2001

Just to let you know we're still around. Not much has been happening recently due to computer problems at our end. Once they are resolved we should hopefully finally be able to release Locked Area Pro v2.0 Stable for sale at $95.00.
We're also currently having a new Locked Area Lock designed. You know the little red padlock in the top logo, well we decided it wasn't very clear and the only copy we have is in a 30x30 pixel format which isn't very useful. So, we should have a new lock soon thanks to Pixel Works.
We also have plans for some other password related software, their are a couple of programs in the works which have temporarily been put aside but soon we should be distributing several security scripts for web sites to suit everyones needs. We'll let you know when they're available.
Please remember, we're always open to comments and questions so please feel free to ask anytime. [OUT OF DATE LINK REMOVED]

Questionaire

30 September 2001

If you can spare a moment or two, please take the time to complete this [OUT OF DATE LINK REMOVED]. The results are for a college project and will not be used by LockedArea.com in anyway. LockedArea.com is simply acting as a gateway to the questionnaire so as to collect more targeted results.
Please see, [OUT OF DATE LINK REMOVED] for more information.

Latest News

28 September 2001

All problems with the site have now been resolved. A couple of bugs were found but it is hopefully now functional. (We hope)
We're now going to work on Locked Area Pro v2.0 to try and complete a stable version for release. We're nearly their, just a couple of bugs left and a few compatiability problems left to iron out.

News Update

23 September 2001

Well, things are going slowly over here. We've fixed a couple of bugs with the site but it all appears to be working fine. Let us know if you find any more bugs.
We hope to release LA Pro v2.0 soon but we need to fully beta test. Just so everyone knows, yes their are versions of LA Pro v2.0 being distributed elsewhere on the internet. These are illegal copies and anyone found to be using them (excluding LockedArea.com beta testers) will find themsleves faced with legal action. Just a warning. You'll also find that the version currently available on the net is fully of bugs and doesn't work very well. So, just so you all know, if you do use it, it won't work. The hacker didn't realise he stole a non-functional version.

New Web Site

17 September 2001

On Friday 14th September, LockedArea.com was hacked by a group going by the name of TNO. These users abused a demo version of the installation file for Locked Area Pro v2.0 that we had stupidally left un-guarded on the site. They then installed an uncountable number of copies of the script causing the site to become unusable. As a precaution we shut down LockedArea.com whilst we restored it and assed the damage caused by this group. We've now restored the site with a new site which we'd been working on prior to the abuse. It has been tested by us but it may still contain bugs so please email problems@lockedarea.com if you find any.
We hope you like the new site, if you do have any comments please don't hesitate to contact us, comments@lockedarea.com.
As you may have noticed, we've swapped from LockedArea.com to Locked-Area.com. The LockedArea.com domain will soon show the same site so any links to us don't need to be modified.

Service Restored

28 August 2001

I've returned from my trip away so service will now return to normal. All support methods are back to normal and all previous messages have been answered. Time will now be focused on the completion of Locked Area Pro v2.0 and the new Locked Area web site which is already 'nearly' complete.

Holiday

06 August 2001

Well right now I´m on holiday in Spain. I´m still checking emails and answering support but due to a huge list of problems, response times are significantly reduced.
I apologise for any inconvenience this may have caused.

Pro News

21 June 2001

Well, I've had several Pro users testing the beta version of 2.0 and apparently it's reasonably stable. Only problems found have been a minor one with the optional fields system. Other than that the only problems have been with links and text within the script being either incorrect or just tricky to understand so nothing major. :o)
I'm currently working on a new site so hopefully once done, I will be releasing a stable version of 2.0.

Pro Beta Available

16 June 2001

I've got the LA Pro v2.0 Beta Release done. The installation wizard is written (and two hours of taking bugs out done) so it's done. I've tested it on this server and on Hypermart.net and it seems to work okay so all LA Pro registered users are welcome to beta test it. Please email beta@lockedarea.com if intrested including username and password for Pro members area.

Pro Beta Release

16 June 2001

Well, Locked Area Pro v2.0 Beta should be released by the end of the day. This will only be a beta release and will not be guranteed to work, it will contain no documentation. The documentation is still being written and will be released when v2.0 stable comes out.
We are looking for Beta testers but this is currently only available to currently registered Pro users. If you would like to beta test the Pro version and are registered for Locked Area Pro with us please email beta@lockedarea.com or contact Neil on ICQ: 119733924
All queries about the new LA Pro should be directed to this ICQ too.

LA Pro Update

10 June 2001

Right, I've spent the whole day working on it, so I think a price rise is fair enough. It's going to take at least another day to completely tweak.
Backup of log and data files added, user management feature done except for a couple of little bits.
Communication feature finished, this includes bulk email and news announcements feature.
Statisitics of members area re-designed etc...
Online configuration stuff half done but it really is taking ages. I've done two configuration files and its taken over an hour and I've got two more to go so you do the maths.
Documentation, well, that needs doing. lol
Administration feature allowing for multiple admins with different access levels isn't done and won't be in this version I'm afraid. But it will support multiple admins. The members area will be protected using .htaccess so it's super secure and easier for me! :o)
So, pretty good so far.
Things like multiple members areas should be in next version.
I'll hopefully distribute a patch that allows intergration with iBill as that's easy. Also, a patch to link Locked Area Pro with other database based scripts will be hopefully released. So you won't have to ask your users to join your members area, forum etc... separately.
Hope this sounds good!

Pro News

10 June 2001

Sorry I'm posting a lot about LA Pro, I'm just getting really motivated with it and some people seem to like knowing what's going on.
Okay, admin scripts are now being done. I've added loads of great new features, I've just finished re-writing the authorisation of signups features, I've also chucked in a suspend and unsuspend account feature. Useful for pay per perious sites.
I'll try and write a script that automatically suspends users who have been members for X days soon.

- Neil

LA Pro v2.0

09 June 2001

Well, I've now re-written all the signup scripts and account management scripts for members etc...
Features include all listed in previous post, account modify, password changing, lost password feature, delete account and lots more.
Locked Area Pro users should receive an email in the next few days hopefully with a demo url so you can have a look and make any suggestions.
v2.0 offers full customisation ability including header and footer files, and customisable table colours etc and font faces, colours and sizes etc...
I want to add language packs soon so I can distibute different language versions but I'm still trying to think of the best way to do it.

LA Pro Update

08 June 2001

Well, I'm finally getting down to it. LA Pro is now in production. But not v1.2 as originally promised. It's now v2.0, this is basically because it's a complete re-write of the entire system. Currently I've completed the user signup stuff.
Features new to it are user validation with validation codes.
Banning of usernames, ips and email addresses from signing up.
Up to 10 extra fields on signup form.
More secure random password generation.
A lots more.
I'm now working on the account management panel which gives users the ability to change passwords etc...
Then it's just the admin panel to re-do (the biggest part of the system) and it will be finished and released.
No date yet set for release but hopefully at this rate before the end of June.

LA Lite - NT

06 June 2001

Well, after so much nagging I'm finally getting round to working on a NT version of Locked Area Lite. I've been kindly given some space by Ben Uhlig so thanks very much to him. No target date set yet because I don't know much about programming for NT (yet :)

New Lite Release

03 June 2001

Well, I finally got round to it and release version 2.6 of Locked Area Lite. New features include change password facility for members, admin failed login log file (tracks nasty people who try and guess your admin password) and a new improved installation panel. Check out the members area for download information. I'm afraid I havn't updated the demo yet so that's still v2.5. Also, Pro v1.2 has not been updated. I'm still working on the new version of that!

Not much news

10 May 2001

I just thought I should update you on what's new. Well, not much.
I've been working on a complete re-write of Locked Area Pro, try and do some more this weekend.
I've also been working on a new design for the site, not much progress. I just can't decide what I like and what I don't! :o(
I'm afraid their won't be much new for a few weeks because I have exams at school for a while, important sort of exams and I thought it might be a nice idea to make some sort of an effort.
After those, I'll hopefully release some new stuff!

LA Pro

04 May 2001

Well, I'm now started a complete re-write of Locked Area Pro. No deadline set yet. Just wanted to let you know I'd started and I'm hoping to include a lot of great new features!

Downtime Over

02 May 2001

Apparently the down time was completed successfully last night.
Sadly it was delayed for a few days due to upstream provider problems of not meeting deadlines.

Top rated again

30 April 2001

Well, yet more publicity for Locked Area.
We're not only the top rated Perl Password Protection script on The CGI Resource Index but now we're the highest rated script on HotScripts.com.
Click Here to see us at the top of the Perl listings. (You'll have to scroll down a bit)

Downtime Update

25 April 2001

Just to let you know, the server move causing downtime has now been scheduled for Thursday PM.

LA Lite news

24 April 2001

Well, I've decided that v2.6 of Locked Area Lite will not be the final release. I don't see the point in stopping a project that I enjoy so much so expect a lot of future releases of Locked Area Lite and Pro as well as a collection of Locked Area related sites.

Pending downtime

22 April 2001

From midnight (EST) on Tuesday for about 5 - 10 hours LockedArea.com will be down due to a server move. We apologise for any inconvenience this may of caused!

Support is back

22 April 2001

Okay, I'm back after a very nice holiday. All previous support questions sent over the last few days have now been answered and support should now be back to normal!!

No Support For 3...

17 April 2001

I'm afriad their will be no support until Saturday. I recommend you use the support forum now because someone else may be able to answer your questions! Sorry about this!

LA is No.1!

12 April 2001

Sorry about the weird subject line!
Anyway, just wanted to let you know that Locked Area is now the highest rated password protection perl script listed on The CGI Resource Index, the most popular CGI script listing on the net.
Locked Area has been voted 9.73/10 by 628 people leaving the competition way behind. We've also been commented on by some of our visitors and have recieved a rating of 4 and a half stars out of five. Putting us at the top of the list!
Have a look at The CGI Resource Index: Password Protection.
Thanks a lot to everyone for supporting us!

LA Lite

12 April 2001

At this very moment, I'm working on the final version of Locked Area Lite, hopefully to be released tomorrow. If you have any feature suggestions, please send them straight away too neil@lockedarea.com

Support Notice

08 April 2001

For the next two weeks, all forms of support will be cut down. Email, helpdesk and forum support will still be available, but responses may be a little slower than normal. Please don't let this deter you, questions will hopefully be answered on a daily basis except between the 18th and 21st April in which support will only be available via the forum. Sorry about this!

User Polls

06 April 2001

Well, I've just opened yet another part of the site. Yesterday it was the Tutorials Centre, today it's the User Polls.
This is basically a collection of polls for all Locked Area Lite users so we can get a little feed back on what our users think.
Check them out at: [OUT OF DATE LINK REMOVED]

Tutorials Centre

05 April 2001

Yet again, we've added a new part to the site. This time it's a tutorial centre. It basically contains some Beginner, Intermediate and Advanced internet tutorials aimed at webmasters. Quite intresting. Thanks goes to Martin Kemp from www.mpk-online.com for the tutorials!
Check them out at [OUT OF DATE LINK REMOVED]

LA Pro Update

02 April 2001

We've had a few problems starting the new version of Locked Area Pro. But hopefully work should begin this week so we should still hopefully make the deadline! Brooks Sizemore has taken over the job now. He'll be doing the majority of the script and then I'll be make some changes when he's completed his bit.
If you're interested in what new features are going to be include, please email [OUT OF DATE LINK REMOVED] and I can give you information on v1.2 as it's planned at the moment.

New Partnership

31 March 2001

Just thought I'd inform you of our new partnership with http://www.thecgisite.com/. TheCGISite.com is a great resource for hundreds of CGI scripts. They have everything from counters to password protection scripts (sadly). Go have a look, it's a very nice site!!

Pro v1.1 Prob

28 March 2001

I've been really dumb. I apoligise to all Locked Area Pro v1.1 users. Their was a small prob in v1.1 with the urls to images in the script. I fixed this a few weeks back for the opening of the new site. But I was dumb enough to not upload it over the old copy, so everyone got stuck with the bug in it. That's now been fixed and the new version of v1.1 is now available. Sorry about that!

Resource Index

26 March 2001

Well, I've just added the resource index. [OUT OF DATE LINK REMOVED]
I just had the random idea to add a resource index so I took the databases from an old resource site of mine and added it! Good 30 min job I thought. Please have a look around and tell me what you think. I hope you like it. Please also add your site if it fits in with the topic!

Latest News

26 March 2001

Well, work on Locked Area Pro v1.2 is about to begin, so the May 1st deadline should hopefully be made trouble free. I'm aiming for it to be finished on the 25th of April so as to give some time for beta testing so all Locked Area Pro users are welcome to beta test it if they wish. If you'd like to do this, please email the support team closer to the date.
I'm also hopeing to start work on Locked Area Lite version 2.6. This will quite probably be the final ever release. I'm hoping for some small changes such as easier customisation of the general look of the script. This will include header and footer html being held in separate text files rather than within the scripts as it is at present because a lot of people find this very confusing. I'm also hoping to write an online customisation form so admins can edit the general look of the script such as fonts, font colours, table sizes etc...
We havn't set a deadline on this yet but it will hopefully be around the same time as Locked Area Pro.
I made some small tweaks to the site also yesterday. These include a lot of editing to the news script, some backend script modification (after bug notification) and some general layout of the mainpage.
I've also been working out some partnerships with some related sites to hopefully improve the site in general. Details of these will be released later. Hopefully within a week or so.
I've also found some old news archives from achient versions of the site which I added in to the news page. Not much point, but it's good to have some sort of a record.
The site is finally starting to wake up after the re-opening, the forum is a lot more active and the help desk hasn't stopped with new questions being asked constantly. Email support is still going strong also and I'll hopefully be able to keep it up for a while though I may have to cut down on it's use at some point in the future due to the time it's taking me to manage.

Partners Needed

25 March 2001

LockedArea.com is currently looking for partners for button and text link swaps.
If your site meets the following criteria and you are interested in a
partnership with us then please email us at [OUT OF DATE LINK REMOVED]

• Your web site must be targeted at/related to: webmasters, web site owners, Perl, internet programming or general internet resources.
• Your web site must receive at least 20,000 page views/month.

Update

23 March 2001

Firslty, I'd like to say thanks. We're now receiving 8000 hits a day. Thank you.
We're about to start work on Locked Area Pro v1.2. We've got a whole list of features we're planning to add. Not all will be done for v1.2 but most will. Their's a total of 24 features. I've been working very closely with current users and possible future users to come up with new features to make the program more attractive!

Problems

18 March 2001

Umm, well, I'm an idiot.
I was testing some scripts I wrote for Locked Area Pro v1.2 but it appears they had some bugs. Basically, I just lost the Locked Area Lite members area database. I've restored an old backup, but anyone who has joined in the last two days will have lost their account!
I'm very very sorry!

New Site Open

17 March 2001

Ok, well, over a month of hard work but I think it was worth it. The new LockedArea.com web site is open. It's got loads of great new stuff but rather than bothering to tell you about it, I suggest you just go and have a look for yourself. If you do find any bugs please email me at [OUT OF DATE LINK REMOVED] about them! I would really appreciate it!
Sorry for the delay and I must appologise that I havn't released the new version of Locked Area Lite as promised, but I hope to soon! Sorry.
I'd also like to say thanks to Brooks Sizemore for his help with some of the Perl coding, generally when it's too late for my little brain to find the bugs! I'd also like to thank Vinay from Kryogen Hosting for all his help with the hosting and get things going. Thanks guys!

Site Redesign

13 March 2001

Well, the majority of the site is finished. We just have to complete the members areas. We hope you like the new site. We've done some major backend script development and we have a great new signup form for Locked Area Pro users so hopefully their signups will take less time and the process will hopefully be a lot more efficient.
Sadly, we've just recieved some bad news about the members areas, our new host isn't happy about us using CGI scripts for the members areas because they are such high traffic so they've suggested us using PHP scripts for it. This is sadly going to delay the opening of the site but hopefully it will be open soon!

Pro Price Change

12 March 2001

Locked Area Pro v1.2 will be releasing soon. It's going to be a lot more powerful than the old version and because of this and the costs of hosting and managing this site we've decided to raise the cost. It will be changing from $60 USD to $90 USD. It will be releasing on the 1st May 2001. So, from 1st May 2001 the price will be $90. All current users and any users that join before that date (paying $60) will have full access to upgrades to v1.2. So, if you are planning to buy Locked Area Pro or are interested in the new features please visit the Locked Area Pro information page and get your order in soon so you can take full advantage of the low price. After that date Locked Area Pro will not be available for $60.

Latest News

12 March 2001

A lot has been happening at LockedArea.com recently. New site design, new server, new backend scripts and lots more.
We've added a lot of new content also which we hope you like. There's also not much left now so we hope to have the site officially opened soon. Just got to finish the Locked Area Pro content and re-design the members area. Then we're done.

New Version

16 August 2000

Version 2.31 has been released. Slight changes! Nothing to shout about! Also the toolbar design in the scripts and members area have changed!!

We're open!

15 August 2000

Today is a great day :o)
Well. Ok. We're officially open and Locked Area version 2.3 is out! v2.4 will be out in a couple of days hopefully! But please still get v2.3 v2.4 only has a different locked.cgi. Infact only a couple of lines different!
Anyway. Enjoy the site :o) I've (Neil) put a hell of a lot of hard late night work into it! I just hope it's all ok! If you do find any bugs please do take the time to tell me! neil@skirrow.com is my email address at the min!

Apologies

15 August 2000

We're having a bit of trouble with the account wizard so we might be have to release it temporarily without the install wizard and as bare scripts! Our apologies for this!! We're still going to make this deadline though!!

Sorry about this.....

11 August 2000

Sorry about this. We've been putting off the opening of this site so much! But we're getting their! We've transferred hosts and are now sorted on a new fast server! Which we're quite happy about! We've gradually got everything fully working and we've setup a demo of Locked Area Lite too! Aswell as the Locked Area Pro page!
Well. We've still working on the setup wizard for Locked Area v2.3 and we hope to have that released by Wednesday 15th August!! I'm currently working on v2.4 already and that should be finished a couple of days after v2.3!!

Latest update

25 July 2000

Sorry for the delay with Locked Area Pro. We've decided to make a few changes to our original plans! Locked Area Lite is still free and the same but Locked Area Pro will now be $50* and will basically have a few more features than Locked Area Lite and you will be allowed to remove the Powered by Locked Area text and link. The Locked Area Pro we had previously planned will now be known as Locked Area Enterprise and will sell for $125*. This will hopefully be much more powerful and have loads of great new features.
* = if you pay by cheque.

Site Updates

21 July 2000

The members area is now up and working and we've added a few other things to the site including some statistics to the mainpage!

New Site and New Release

21 July 2000

Well, as you can see. We've got an all new site. Let me explain what's happening!
Recently Ignition Scripting became Web-ScriptsUK (www.web-scripts.co.uk). Their was no real reason for this but we needed a more professional sounding name and domain!
A long with this new company. We've registered LockedArea.com for this script. No real reason again why, just sounds more professional!
Along with all this. We've been working very hard on v2.3. Which is not available for download!! It's a lot better with a lot of new features including an all new admin area and members area stats script. See main page for list of all the new features!!
Their are now 4 programmers working on this script (Neil Skirrow(me), Bigi Lui, Mike Mabe and Brooks Sizemore). So updates should be a lot more regular and you can expect a lot of great new stuff!!