Keeping track of every Jaguar E-Type, with your help.
xkedata > blog > 2006 > 09

Many apologies, but somehow my photo uploader was not saving category choices or captions for a short while, though the photos themselves saved fine. I must have introduced this “feature” when I did my streamlining…it was a little too streamlined, as it turned out.

If you’ve been here for awhile, you may recall a now defunct section called “Meet & Greet.” It was cumbersome to use, and its main gee-whiz feature was a tool which allowed you to find nearby cars and owners (assuming you were in the USA). With the elimination of postal codes from the database, Meet & Greet’s raison d’être was gone. The old owner information was not lost (though the city, state and postal info was deleted) and now the section has been re-worked and opened for business again as “owners.”

This section is a tool for owners to allow other folks to get in touch with you about your car, and maybe share a little information about yourself. When someone views your car’s page, your name appears to the right of the dataplate, linked to our anonymous email form. You can put in your real name or a “handle.” If you want, you can add a few lines of text about yourself, and even upload a small photo. See my car 876073 for an example. You can “own” any car these sites cover (assuming you actually own the car), as long as it is in the database–you can enter XKs from the XKE side or vice versa.

One really cool reason to do this: the site will now email you whenever someone leaves a comment about your car, if you opt to have it do so.

This is not a way to claim ownership of information or photos on the site regarding a particular car. Other site users are still welcome to add information, photos, or comments at their discretion to a car you are listed as owner of.

Remember, we never reveal email addresses…if someone uses the form after clicking on your name, they are sending “blind.” They have no idea where the email went or what your address is.

This has been reasonably tested…but please email me if something doesn’t work as expected. Former users of the meet and greet section can use the “lost password” feature to gain access.

Please review our terms and conditions before using the feature. Finally, I’m going to be hard-core about any conflicts, deliberate mischief, or other abuse. We have a remarkably decent group of people using this site, so I hope to never have any reason to exercise my ability to ban anyone from accessing this site–but I will if someone deliberately claims a car they don’t legally own.

Added a link directly to all exterior photos of the same color, in case you wish to see more of them.

812884

Only a single photo of this machine, but it’s a beauty!

I’ve noticed a bit of an uptick in the number of spammy comments coming through the site recently, please let me know if you see anything that needs to be deleted.

A little odd it canot be embedded…but here’s another video of an E-Type, a FHC this time.

If you see a car number which simply cannot be the car described, please let me know…since the numbers can easily be entered wrong (or listed wrong in an ad), it’s not a surprise a few will be inaccurate. If a number is reported as wrong, I usually discuss it with Steven, Dana and Paul to see if we can come to a consensus about it. If you’re an expert on XK numbers and would like to be involved, let me know, be happy to have some more experience on that side of things.

If someone changes the dataplate by adding incorrect information, feel free to correct it. This is somewhat like wikipedia in that regard.

Finally, as a site user, be aware that the “record changes” section simply mirrors database edits and shouldn’t be construed as necessarily reflecting changes to the car itself–though of course that can be the case, obviously.

Three things are currently in the works:

1. Owners. This used to be “Meet and Greet” but the section was cumbersome and not oft used, which is fine. The new section will be simpler, you just tell the database which cars you own, and your name will appear on the car page. If there is any dispute we will settle the matter like gentlemen: the “real” owner can send me a photo with their email address handwritten on paper next to their dataplate. I can’t imagine ever needing to do so, but stranger things have happened. This site is not meant to be an owner’s club, really, I hope we encourage participation above and beyond only those fortunate to be saddled with an elderly Jaguar…but having some sort of owner mechanism in place is nice for those people who want to use it.
2. Classifieds. This will require two things. Your car must be in the database, and you must be registered as the owner via the above mechanism. Otherwise, it will be free and open to all, dealers or private parties. (The ad itself will be copied into the history of the car.) The ads will display a photo of your choice from your uploads and a brief section of ad copy. The ad will link to your car’s page on the site so people can view more photos, see the history, etc.
3. Saloons. The database will be expanded to handle the classic post-war saloons: Mk. VII, VIII, IX; Mk. I, II, 240, 340; Mk. 10 and 420G; S-Type; and the 420. A veritable serial number stew, alas.

It will remain to be seen how soon I can get to these. I have lots of work at the moment plus some calendars to create.

To balance out the blogger’s shortcut (posting YouTube video), here’s an in-car shot of an XK-120. Nice sounding car.

There are a couple of other clips as well on the site. As always, if you can’t hear the audio, click on the video to go directly to YouTube’s site, it generally works there.

Found this on YouTube, a never-ending fount of interesting videos.