Visitors to Stoke on Trent's newly revamped website are being greeted with a number of page not found and pages with visual errors today.

As I tried to access a page about dog fouling on the website via Environment drop down, I was created with

404 Not Found

/ccm-ldn-navigation/files/transport-and-streets/streets/dog-fouling/ was not found on this server.

---

Resin 2.1.16 (built Tue Feb 15 11:12:27 PST 2005)

A few clicks later I then came across a page with a very open error, revealing a lot about the council website's servers structure in the community and living area of the site

Notice
An unexpected error has occurred
An unexpected error has occurred. If this continues to be a problem for you please contact the administrators of the site quoting the following:

CCM issue report code: 10.4.8.18:fe1db2:131e1b528db

-*-*-*-*-*- Begin Error Report -*-*-*-*-*-
-*-*-*- ACS Error Report Code: 10.4.8.18:fe1db2:131e1b528db -*-*-*-
-*-*-*- Message 1: com.caucho.jsp.JspLineException: null (root cause: null) -*-*-*-
-*-*-*- Message 2: com.arsdigita.util.UncheckedWrapperException: null (root cause: null) -*-*-*-
-*-*-*- Message 3: java.lang.NullPointerException: null -*-*-*-

-*-*-*- Section: Request summary -*-*-*-
Context path:
Request URI: /ccm/navigation/community-and-living/
Query string: null
Method: GET
Remote user: null

-*-*-*- Section: Cookies -*-*-*-
JSESSIONID: av1THF2Qfiff (expires: -1)
ad_path: Stoke-on-Line|175|14008|14026 (expires: -1)
__utma: 157744357.1859831655.1313746419.1313746419.1313751242.2 (expires: -1)
__utmb: 157744357.16.10.1313751242 (expires: -1)
__utmc: 157744357 (expires: -1)
__utmz: 157744357.1313751242.2.2.utmcsr=google|utmccn=(organic)|utmcmd=organic|utmctr=http://www.stoke.gov.uk/events (expires: -1)

-*-*-*- Section: CCM User -*-*-*-
Party not logged in

-*-*-*- Section: Servlet attributes -*-*-*-
class com.arsdigita.london.navigation.NavigationFileResolver.categoryPath: [Lcom.arsdigita.categorization.Category;@1fa23c7
com.arsdigita.bebop.PageState: com.arsdigita.bebop.PageState@142fea1 = {
m_page = com.arsdigita.aplaws.ui.SimplePage@bf6637,
m_request = com.caucho.server.http.DispatchRequest@d630c6,
m_response = com.caucho.server.http.RunnerResponse@1a53154,
m_pageState = com.arsdigita.bebop.FormData@15b1c79 = {
m_parameterDataValues = {bbp.9.column={null, []}, bbp.s={null, []}, bbp.10.sel={null, []}, bbp.e={null, []}, bbp.6.portal={50166, []}, bbp.v={null, []}, bbp.i={{}, []}, g11n.enc={UTF-8, []}},
m_formErrors = null,
m_model = com.arsdigita.bebop.FormModel@e35e0c,
m_locale = en,
m_isTransformed = true,
m_isValid = false,
m_isSubmission = true
},
m_attributes = null,
,
m_grabbingComponent = null,
m_invisible = {}
}
com.arsdigita.bebop.RequestLocal: {com.arsdigita.bebop.Page$1@11a6209=com.arsdigita.bebop.Label@1338929, com.arsdigita.london.portal.ui.WorkspaceSelectionModel$1@14902af=com.arsdigita.london.portal.Workspace-id-49912, com.arsdigita.bebop.RequestLocal@11a646a=null, com.arsdigita.kernel.ui.ACSObjectSelectionModel$1@68a8d8=true}
com.arsdigita.dispatcher.RequestContext: com.arsdigita.sitenode.SiteNodeRequestContext@1c98fb6
com.arsdigita.dispatcher.RequestValue: {com.arsdigita.dispatcher.RequestValue@1ccb1dd=null}
com.arsdigita.kernel.ACSObject:50166: com.arsdigita.london.portal.WorkspacePage-id-50166
com.arsdigita.web.BaseApplicationServlet.application_id: 175
com.arsdigita.web.BaseDispatcher.dispatched: true
com.arsdigita.web.BaseServlet.request_url: /ccm/navigation/community-and-living/

-*-*-*- Section: Stack trace -*-*-*-
java.lang.NullPointerException

-*-*-*- Section: HTTP headers -*-*-*-
Accept: text/html,application/xhtml+xml,application/xml;q=0.9,*/*;q=0.8
Accept-Charset: ISO-8859-1,utf-8;q=0.7,*;q=0.3
Accept-Encoding: gzip,deflate,sdch
Accept-Language: en-GB,en-US;q=0.8,en;q=0.6
Connection: keep-alive
Cookie: JSESSIONID=av1THF2Qfiff; ad_path=Stoke-on-Line|175|14008|14026; __utma=157744357.1859831655.1313746419.1313746419.1313751242.2; __utmb=157744357.16.10.1313751242; __utmc=157744357; __utmz=157744357.1313751242.2.2.utmcsr=google|utmccn=(organic)|utmcmd=organic|utmctr=http://www.stoke.gov.uk/events
Host: www.stoke.gov.uk
Referer: http://www.stoke.gov.uk/ccm/navigation/environment/
UNIQUE_ID: Tk5C2sCoqAcAABQCjtA
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.0) AppleWebKit/535.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/14.0.835.94 Safari/535.1

-*-*-*- Section: System properties -*-*-*-
ccm.conf: /usr/share/ccm/conf/registry
ccm.home: /usr/share/ccm
com.arsdigita.london.navigation.DefaultContentSection: /content/
com.arsdigita.util.Assert.enabled: true
file.encoding: ISO646-US
file.encoding.pkg: sun.io
file.separator: /
http.nonProxyHosts: localhost|sun-server-097|sun-server-147|test.stoke.gov.uk|webfeed1|www2002.stoke.gov.uk|webapps.stoke.gov.uk
http.proxyHost: 10.4.1.135
http.proxyPort: 8080
java.awt.graphicsenv: sun.awt.X11GraphicsEnvironment
java.awt.printerjob: sun.print.PSPrinterJob
java.class.path: /opt/oracle/product/client/jdbc/lib/classes12.jar:/opt/oracle/product/10.1.0/client_1/jdbc/lib/ojdbc14.jar:/usr/jdk1.6.0_23/lib/tools.jar:/opt/resin/resin-2.1.16/lib/resin.jar:/opt/resin/resin-2.1.16/lib/jdbc2_0-stdext.jar:/opt/resin/resin-2.1.16/lib/jta_101.jar:/opt/resin/resin-2.1.16/lib/jndi.jar:/opt/resin/resin-2.1.16/lib/dom.jar:/opt/resin/resin-2.1.16/lib/sax.jar:/opt/resin/resin-2.1.16/lib/jaxp.jar:/opt/resin/resin-2.1.16/lib/jmx.jar:/opt/resin/resin-2.1.16/lib/webutil.jar:/opt/resin/resin-2.1.16/lib/jdbc-mysql.jar:/usr/java/lib/tools.jar:/usr/java/jre/lib/rt.jar:/opt/resin/resin-2.1.16/lib/jsdk23.jar
java.class.version: 50.0
java.endorsed.dirs: /usr/jdk1.6.0_23/jre/lib/endorsed
java.ext.dirs: /usr/java/jre/lib/ext:/usr/java/lib/ext:/usr/share/ccm/webapps/WEB-INF/system
java.home: /usr/jdk1.6.0_23/jre
java.io.tmpdir: /var/tmp/
java.library.path: /usr/jdk1.6.0_23/jre/lib/sparc/server:/usr/jdk1.6.0_23/jre/lib/sparc:/usr/jdk1.6.0_23/jre/../lib/sparc:/opt/oracle/product/10.1.0/client_1/lib32:/opt/resin/resin-2.1.16/libexec:/usr/jdk/packages/lib/sparc:/usr/lib
java.naming.factory.initial: com.caucho.naming.InitialContextFactoryImpl
java.naming.factory.url.pkgs: com.caucho.naming
java.protocol.handler.pkgs: com.arsdigita.util.protocol|com.arsdigita.util.protocol
java.runtime.name: Java(TM) SE Runtime Environment
java.runtime.version: 1.6.0_23-b05
java.specification.name: Java Platform API Specification
java.specification.vendor: Sun Microsystems Inc.
java.specification.version: 1.6
java.vendor: Sun Microsystems Inc.
java.vendor.url: http://java.sun.com/
java.vendor.url.bug: http://java.sun.com/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi
java.version: 1.6.0_23
java.vm.info: mixed mode
java.vm.name: Java HotSpot(TM) Server VM
java.vm.specification.name: Java Virtual Machine Specification
java.vm.specification.vendor: Sun Microsystems Inc.
java.vm.specification.version: 1.0
java.vm.vendor: Sun Microsystems Inc.
java.vm.version: 19.0-b09
javax.xml.parsers.DocumentBuilderFactory: org.apache.xerces.jaxp.DocumentBuilderFactoryImpl
javax.xml.parsers.SAXParserFactory: org.apache.xerces.jaxp.SAXParserFactoryImpl
javax.xml.transform.TransformerFactory: com.icl.saxon.TransformerFactoryImpl
line.separator:

log4j.configuration: file:///usr/share/ccm/conf/log4j.properties
org.xml.sax.driver: com.caucho.xml.Xml
os.arch: sparc
os.name: SunOS
os.version: 5.9
path.separator: :
resin.home: /usr/share/ccm
sun.arch.data.model: 32
sun.boot.class.path: /usr/jdk1.6.0_23/jre/lib/resources.jar:/usr/jdk1.6.0_23/jre/lib/rt.jar:/usr/jdk1.6.0_23/jre/lib/sunrsasign.jar:/usr/jdk1.6.0_23/jre/lib/jsse.jar:/usr/jdk1.6.0_23/jre/lib/jce.jar:/usr/jdk1.6.0_23/jre/lib/charsets.jar:/usr/jdk1.6.0_23/jre/lib/modules/jdk.boot.jar:/usr/jdk1.6.0_23/jre/classes
sun.boot.library.path: /usr/jdk1.6.0_23/jre/lib/sparc
sun.cpu.endian: big
sun.cpu.isalist:
sun.io.unicode.encoding: UnicodeBig
sun.java.launcher: SUN_STANDARD
sun.jnu.encoding: ISO646-US
sun.management.compiler: HotSpot Tiered Compilers
sun.os.patch.level: unknown
user.dir: /usr/share/ccm
user.home: /var/www
user.language: en
user.name: servlet
user.timezone: GB
-*-*-*-*-*- End Error Report -*-*-*-*-*-

A chairman from a local Residents Association has also flagged up with the council for nearly a year that his RA, and many others including the Bankeyfields Residents Association aren't included on the official lists. Which can make it very difficult for residents trying to find information, or by just simply being recognised by the council as been a official Residents Association for your area.

Currently the councils Residents Association web page is showing as Page Not Found.

Richard French Chairman of the QRAT (tunstall park area) had this to say

You can quote me as saying: Queensland Residents Association Tunstall has been in existence for 3 years, and is still not included on the Councils Web Site R.A.s section. I have asked our Councillor Dave Conway on three occasions during this past month to pass our details on, for inclusion on the council web site. The residents association’s information that is shown is well out of date, and for a council that have this to say “We take tenants' and residents' associations very seriously in Stoke-on-Trent.” is disgusting in my view. The public have no way of knowing if they are represented by an R.A. in their area when public information is so outdated.

Speaking as a industry expert, it doesn't take a lot to create a nice fall over pages for 404 Page not found pages or error pages.

http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2009/01/29/404-error-pages-one-more-time/
http://speckyboy.com/2010/03/10/50-exanples-of-creative-404-page-not-fou...

As a resident of Stoke on Trent I feel we aren't getting best value for money from the council in relation to their website, and was horrified to learn recently that they plan to spend £80k of electronic payments, and £250k of website security.

Payment gateways and back end integration does not cost £80k and website security should not be costing £250k. A sure sign that our council is still using a out of date tendering system, and have the expertise their end to even understand the processes.