Some good news for anyone who has been waiting for a BBC News iPhone app: the BBC Trust has just announced that the BBC's plans to launch dedicated smartphone applications for BBC News, Sport and iPlayer "do not require further scrutiny through a Public Value Test". This means the News app should be available from later today.

At the About The BBC blog, the director of BBC Future Media and Technology, Erik Huggers, announces the launch and at the BBC Internet Blog the executive product manager for BBC Mobile, David Madden, describes the features - so read on and comment at Erik's or David's post.

Update 1231: There's now a News website story about the app and you can watch a demo with David Madden at the BBC YouTube channel.

Steve Herrmann is editor of the BBC News website.

• Bookmark with:
• del.icio.us |
• Digg |
• Newsvine |
• NowPublic |
• Reddit
• - What's this?

Thank you for all your feedback on the BBC News website redesign. There has been a lot of it, and we'll continue to sort through the comments and e-mails we've been receiving, identifying specific issues we can address and adding answers to the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) page.

Most of you commenting here on the Editors blog have been critical, with many urging us to change the design back to the way it was. Given the strength of feeling expressed in some of the comments, I'd like to explain again, as clearly as I can, what our thinking is.

• Reverting to the old design is not something we're considering, but building and continuing to improve on the changes we've made certainly is.
• We are looking closely at the comments and feedback we are getting on all aspects of the new design, and we'll also be carefully watching usage, traffic and conducting further audience research, as we would after any such change.
• There will be a review process and if changes need to be made, they will be considered as part of that.
• There are a few things not yet working exactly the way they should be - our developers and designers are tackling those now, and we are addressing them in the FAQs.
• The changes we have made are based on careful research and thinking about how the site can work at its best now, and how we can make sure it is adaptable enough to continue to evolve, not stand still.

Along with everyone else on the design, technical and editorial teams here who have worked together to try to improve the site and the systems which produce it, I hope you will grow to like it, if you don't already (and thanks to those of you who have let us know you do!)

Here's what we've already said about the reasons for the new design, why we didn't run a public beta and the thinking behind the design itself.

Many of the specific issues you've raised are tackled in our FAQs page and we've added some further updates there, which are also summarised below.

Thanks again to all who have commented here - I'm sorry I haven't been able to reply to everyone individually. The intention of these blog posts over the past couple of weeks has been to let you know what we are doing, and why. I hope that even if you are one of those who doesn't agree with what we've done, you at least understand a bit more about it.

We'll continue to follow the feedback, and to address specific issues where we can in the FAQs page.

  • Where has Europe and other world regional weather gone?
We are currently working on better ways to present weather in our world regional sections, and hope to re-introduce it soon.

  • Why don't you have a single list of the main News blogs linked from the front page?
We do not currently have a single destination page aggregating all our News blogs, but we link to blogs individually on relevant section indexes around the site, also on related stories and on the front page, depending on the news agenda. All the blogs are also linked to from the right hand navigation within any individual blog post. There is now a new section on many of the main indexes called "Expert Views" which does provide a home for blogs in the respective subject areas. For these reasons we do not currently have a permanent link to all of them on the front page.

  • Can I turn off the Facebook option?
Some of you have contacted us to say that your work computer blocks access to Facebook which is causing you problems looking at our pages that embed the Facebook "Recommend" button. We're working to see if there is an automatic solution to this, but in the mean time, if you would like to remove these Facebook buttons, then you can do so by clicking here to set a cookie. This will tell us not to show you the Facebook buttons. If you would like the Facebook buttons back at any point, simply clear your cookies. If you clear your cookies you will need to visit the link above again to re-hide the Facebook buttons.

  • Why does video slow down my story page download?
Some of you have reported that the video player in our stories is sometimes slowing down your experience of using our site. This will be particularly true if you are using a slower connection, but we are aware that it is an issue and are working to resolve it as soon as possible.

  • Is the site designed just for large screens?
We tested the site extensively on all modern browsers and screen resolutions, however, we have received a number of comments from some of you with small screens saying that the text on our pages is too close to the left hand side of your screens - we are still investigating this

Steve Herrmann is editor of the BBC News website.

• Bookmark with:
• del.icio.us |
• Digg |
• Newsvine |
• NowPublic |
• Reddit
• - What's this?

Day three of the redesigned News website, and at the end of a busy week, here's an update on where we've got to.

We've been reviewing all feedback, categorising it, and responding to as much of it as possible, adding the main issues into the Frequently Asked Questions page and summarising them on this blog.

And our journalists have been getting used to the new production tools and different page layouts.

Over the coming days and weeks, we'll be closely watching site traffic data to see how people are actually using the site. We'll also continue to look out for specific issues we can tackle quickly, as we've been doing this week, with updates where relevant to the FAQs page.

Most of the comments in response to my posts here on the redesign have been critical. But, as I've said, we have to assess over time the response of the several million users who come to the site each day by monitoring it in as many ways as we can - this blog is just one of them.

Post-launch reviews are part of any project of this kind: the relevant design, product, technical and editorial people will get together to carefully consider the main areas of feedback and analyse all the data to get as clear a picture as we can of how things are working.

The redesign had a number of objectives such as better presentation of the main stories and features of the day and of our existing local content, and a wider range of video content, and we will check whether we are meeting them.

We undertook exhaustive audience research and user testing before we went ahead with the redesigned site and we hope people will be able to adjust to the changes. If there is something that we find needs changing - based on all the evidence we have - then we will of course change it. That should be part of any post-launch process.

Meanwhile, there are still some things we have not made full use of yet: for example, in-story components such as links to related content and factboxes, bigger image formats and special provision on the front page for a major breaking story.

Lastly, here is the latest round of FAQ updates. We'll continue to maintain this page and welcome further queries and reports of specific issues - with detail and examples where possible.

  • Why is there more white space on the site? Some of you feel there is too much white space on our new pages. On story pages, there are a number of components which we are introducing gradually, so the look of some pages will change slightly as these come into wider use and get included. The additional horizontal space that removing the left-hand navigation has given us also frees up space for bigger images, embedded videos and links to some of our in-depth content. The width of the text column is exactly the same as it was, as we feel this is the optimum width for easy reading. Ensuring you feel comfortable reading our stories, was, and will always be our primary consideration as we develop story pages. The project's Creative Director Paul Sissons explains the thinking behind our use of white space at the BBC Internet Blog.

  • Paragraph length: The length of our paragraphs hasn't changed. We have always kept them short, and sentences too, because on a screen we believe it is easier to scan a news story and read it quickly that way. This has simply become more apparent now that there is more space around the text in stories.

  • Firewalls: Some people have reported issues when using the site within a workplace firewall. For example where the BBC URL is not accessible or issues with the Facebook options. We are committed to making the site as close to universally available as possible, and so will continue to investigate these issues as they arise.

  • Scrolling: Some of you have said you find the new design requires too much scrolling and you'd like to see a "Back to top" button. This looks like a good idea and we will investigate whether we can implement it.

  • Blocked access: Some of you using Kaspersky security software have had problems accessing the BBC website. We have been in contact with Kaspersky and they have resolved the issue with an update.

  • "Local" box giving unexpected results: Some of you have told us that you have come across problems when finding your area in our new "Add My News & Weather Location" box. We are aware of these problems and are taking action to fix them as soon as possible. We hope to have the majority of these problems sorted as soon as possible.

  • Accessibility: Some of you have also been asking about accessibility: there is an FAQ on that here.

Steve Herrmann is editor of the BBC News website.

• Bookmark with:
• del.icio.us |
• Digg |
• Newsvine |
• NowPublic |
• Reddit
• - What's this?