The new and improved MyICE

One of the most popular features of the current ICE website is MyICE, a secure area for members and registered users. Once logged in, users can manage their account and contact details, access books and journals published by ICE, book and pay for events, receive up-to-date news bulletins, and much more.

The new and improved MyICE will carry over all of these features while allowing more user control and personalisation.

Registered users will be prompted to log in with their email address and password (if you already have a PIN it can be used as your password). Those without login details can register online through a user friendly and simple registration process.



Once inside, users can update their personal profile details including contact details, honorary regions, and employment and professional interests. This information will be used to improve and personalise member communication, including voting initiatives and news from across the Institution.

The process of adding online CPD (Continuing Professional Development) objectives and learning plans has also vastly improved. In addition to adding new objectives and closing completed objectives, users will be able to refer to and search previous CPD objectives and activities in their individual archives.


Other feature of MyICE on the new site include a secure ICE membership subscription section, where members will be able to pay their subscriptions, request receipts, and set up or edit Direct Debit mandates

Registered users are also invited to continue submitting questions related to civil engineering to Ask Brunel!, which has been given a new look and a more user-friendly question submission form.

Document library

The current ICE website has a catalogue of over 1300 downloadable documents hosted in the Downloads library. These documents include flyers for events, newsletters, applications, and more.

Though extensive, the current downloads library contains many documents that are no longer relevant (ie flyers for past events) as well as many duplicate documents.

As we transfer content to the new site, we are therefore conducting a thorough review of all documents to ensure that all relevant documents remain available for download.

We began the process by collecting a list of all current documents hosted on the current site and identifying each document’s owner – that is, the author or distributor – within the organisation. We then asked each owner to confirm that the documents listed under their ownership would still be necessary for download after launch.

All documents that were to be carried over were then assigned comprehensive abstracts, or short summaries, as well as lists of relevant keywords. This would ensure that users would be able to find specific downloads with a simple and intuitive search.

As of the beginning of March, approximately 500 of the original 1300 documents have been selected to be carried over to the new site. Any documents that are not carried over to the new site will be backed up in case we ever need to retrieve them.

In addition to offering easier searchability, the new document library also allows for larger individual files. This means that long brochures and presentations as well as image rich documents will be available for download from the new site.

Route to Membership selector

One of the hallmarks of the membership section of the current ICE website is the ‘Find your route to membership’ page. On this page, prospective members can find out which stage they are currently in towards becoming a Professionally Qualified Member.

This is a popular feature on the current site and is essential towards simplifying the often complex process towards becoming an ICE member.

A more dynamic version will be offered on the new website. Known as the Route to Membership selector, this page will allow prospective members to narrow down their process towards membership by answering questions on a single page. As each question is answered, more questions will drop down from a series of dynamic tables below.

This greatly reduces the amount of time a prospective member will spend answering questions and will therefore deliver crucial information regarding membership in a quick and efficient manner. That this information is tailored to each user’s individual profile underscores the importance of personalisation across the new site, for members and non-members alike.

The membership division is currently reviewing the content of the Route to Membership selector to ensure that it delivers the most accurate and up-to-date information.

A closer look at online communities

In the last progress update, we previewed some of the key features of the online communities on the new site. These features include a noticeboard, forum, and media gallery.

The online communities section has been developed and is now live for testing.

The following visuals will give you a clearer understanding of how ICE hopes to engage both members and non-members via online communities.


Each community will have an ‘Overview’ landing page that will offer a snapshot of all the activity going on throughout the community, including latest notices and recent discussions.

The noticeboard enables community administrators to post community announcements, news, and events as well as document attachments. Although only administrators can post new notices, all community members will be able to comment.

Community members will be able to start and contribute to discussions on relevant topics. The forum homepage lists all current discussions as well as the number of posts in response to the discussion.

The web project team is currently testing all aspects of online communities by actively participating in online discussions. Any bugs that arise are being logged for debugging by the eBusiness team.

Progress update: Communities and search functionality

Don’t forget to check out our handy glossary if you are unsure about any web project terms or concepts.

Following the testing and debugging of the Information resources section, eBusiness has been hard at work developing the online communities section as well as the search functionality across the new site.

The communities section will feature both private and public communities for a wide range of topics and regions. Users will be required to register before gaining access to a particular community.

All communities will typically feature the following:

• Notice board: Community members can keep up-to-date with community announcements, news, and events via a blog-style notice board. Documents uploaded to the notice board will include agenda and reports.
• Discussion forum: Members can create or contribute to discussions related to the community topic. Documents can also be uploaded to discussions.
• Image gallery: Members can upload images and view other member’s images.

In addition to the notice board, members can receive community updates – including notification of updated agenda and reports – via email.

Earlier this month, eBusiness developed a proof of concept for the communities section. A proof of concept is a test run of a section of the new site, using our current Content Management System, to ensure that all the necessary functionality has been properly implemented.

The eCommunications team and users from across ICE Group will begin testing the communities section this week before submitting any bugs to the eBusiness team.

eBusiness has also been developing the enhanced search functionality that will be used throughout the new website. The search will feature predictive search; as the user inputs a search item into the search box, a list of popular search results will automatically be generated in a drop down menu just below the search box.

Users can then select their search item from the dropdown predictive search menu or submit their search query for a more comprehensive listing of results.

In order to properly test the search functionality, the eCommunications team has been busy uploading all signed-off content to the new site. The search function will then generate search results from all available content across the entire site.

Focus on... Paul Wright, Business Systems Manager

What is your role in the project?
I am Business Systems Manager at ICE responsible for the development of MEMSYS, our membership and contact database, and integration between MEMSYS and the website to allow members to undertake as many processes as possible online. Over the last 6 years we have developed the MyICE section of the website and now 81% of our members are signed up to MyICE and are able to maintain their membership online. Key facilities that members now have include maintaining contact details, paying subscriptions, setting up Direct Debits & informing us of their professional interests. We have also developed a number of online membership application processes and an event registration facility.

My role in the project is to ensure that these processes will continue to work in the new website. Many of the current online processes are having to be rewritten to meet the new website's design. As the website will rely on personalisation drawn from the users’ records in MEMSYS, it is essential that integration between the website and database is fully tested and robust.

What does your average working day involve?
I would say that about a quarter of my time is spent on the web project. We have weekly conference calls with IRIS, the database suppliers, to ensure that development of the web services and user controls required for the new site are being developed to plan. There are also weekly project team meetings where all aspects of the project are discussed. The majority of my time on the project is spent on managing the software release & testing processes.

Within my team, Joe Elmoufak - Online Process Support Analyst is responsible for the majority of User Acceptance Testing (UAT) on the development. This involves running a series of test scripts against the software developed by IRIS to ensure that the process flows correctly and data is updated accurately.

Which other members of the team do you work closely with?
I work closely with Tim Nickson as it is his team that is integrating the software developed by IRIS into the new website. The software needs to be tested at each step of integration to make sure everything works OK. I work with Julia Fillary to manage the relationship with IRIS. As well as the web development, IRIS are also working on other development projects for ICE so I need to ensure that priorities are agreed and understood to keep all projects on track.

I also work closely with Mark Russell and representatives from the design agency as the new website design will mean an overhaul of the MyICE section. We are working together to ensure that the new website is more attractive and intuitive for users whilst ensuring that the online facilities that they are already used to in MyICE continue to work correctly.

What excites you most about the new website?
The increased visibility of MyICE facilities. 81% of our members are already signed up to MyICE and we are currently taking over £5M a year online via subscription payments, but I am conscious that awareness amongst the membership of the facilities available can be improved. The new website will be based on personalisation so members will be able to see the value of keeping ICE informed of their employment details and professional interests. This will make the new website more relevant for users and assist ICE in ensuring that the activities we run reflect our members interests.

Progress update: Information resources

The new ICE website will feature a section dedicated to the wide variety of policies, procedures, and forms made available to ICE members. This section will be a more organised and easily searchable version of the Downloads library on the current site.

Members will also be able to browse the large catalogue of flyers, policy papers, and other documents both by type and by topic.

ICE members who are logged in will be directed towards resources that match their profile. This will serve to decrease the amount of time members will have to search or browse for documents which already match their specs.

The development of the Information resources section of the new ICE website marks sprint 4 of the ICE web development project plan. The section is currently being tested by the eCommunications team and will be debugged by the eBusiness team during the coming week.