Welcome to FBSchedules version……..4? This is a pretty big update that we’ve been working on since last year.
There are a few design changes on the schedules, especially on the weekly schedules and mobile schedules. Most of the changes are under the hood plus we’ve added some new features. Let’s take a look at each of them.
DATABASE
Since I started the site back in 2008, all of the schedules have been separate html pages that resided outside of WordPress. Every opponent, time, TV, score, and other updates had to be entered within each file. Sometimes that meant updating three or four pages for one game. That’s the main reason why I never added FCS schedules (more on that below).
Now everything is within the WordPress installation, which will make adding games, updating game details and scores quicker and easier. This also allows me to add full weekly schedules and conference specific schedules.
HTTPS
Our site is now HTTPS, which is the secure version of Hypertext Transfer Protocol. Simply put, all communications from your web browser to our web site are now secure. Now web browsers won’t show our site as “Not Secure” right next to the URL in the address bar.
What’s the benefit to you? You can now rest easy that when you type your hot take on our writing, opinion, editing, or…cough cough…Eric’s SEC score predictions, it won’t be intercepted by rogue foreign nations.
MENU
The menu has been scaled down due to “suggestions” from SEO experts and Google. We run some Google Adsense ads here, and Google frowns upon drop-down menus that could cover an ad. In turn, a user could, gulp, accidentally click on an ad.
Google has also stated that too many internal links on a page is bad. So you’ll notice that individual team links have been removed, but you can still access them several ways. There are landing pages for all of the “current” season schedules and future schedule pages (the same team “home” pages we’ve always had, except now with all future schedules on that page). You can also access team pages through the college conference pages (or you can, you know, bookmark pages).
I have received feedback on this both positive and negative, so I’ll continue to look at it and will consider other options.
URL STRUCTURE
Due to moving the schedules into WordPress and adding HTTPS, we have an entirely new URL structure. Current season URL’s will now stay the same, and after the season is over the next season’s data will roll onto the page.
Here is an example for Georgia:
Current: https://fbschedules.com/georgia-football-schedule/
Past: https://fbschedules.com/ncaa-2017/team/georgia/
Future/Team Home: https://fbschedules.com/ncaa/georgia/
Yes, the future schedules are all on one page now. This is more convenient as there are less pages to click through. However, the TBA dates are not listed for those who like to try and pencil in a possible future schedule. I will look at adding TBA dates later.
FCS SCHEDULES
Users have been requesting FCS schedules on the site since it was started back in 2008. About a year ago, I began gathering all of the publicly available data and then followed that up a few months ago with records requests to all FCS schools that are public. That resulted in around 80 games, most of which haven’t been announced yet that I could find.
So now at FBSchedules we have FCS schedules for 2016 through 2018, plus future schedules and opponents. We also have a weekly FCS Schedule and an FCS Playoff Schedule. Hooray!
NEW SITE NAME?
“Now that you’ve added FCS Schedules, are you going to change your site name?” No. The site name has always been FB Schedules (short for Football Schedules) and was never FBS Schedules. Probably why someone squatted on the FBSSchedules.com domain name.
COMING SOON
We plan to add schedules for the AAF (Alliance of American Football) once they are announced. We will also add XFL, but that won’t be anytime soon as they don’t start until 2020 and haven’t named any teams yet.
BUGS
I thought we had most of the obvious bugs resolved before we pushed the new site live on Tuesday evening. I was wrong. It wasn’t a great transition, but everything seems to be running smoothly now.
There have been some inaccurate scores and other details that users have already found. This was bound to occur because I had to prepare 67 seasons for upload into the database (2008-2037 FBS, 2016-2028 FCS, and 2008-2022 NFL).
If you find any inaccuracies, please leave a comment, send an email, or contact us on Twitter. Thanks for visiting FBSchedules.com!