The  original  idea  behind  BootLog  was to create a permanent home for Boot Camp, Faqs! Facts! Fax! and Over 2 You the popular weekly columns published in The Daily Telegraph Connected section since 1996, and now back in its regular slot on the Telegraph's Digital Life website and look out for my new column 'Houson We Have  A Problem' in the Saturday edition of The Daily Telegraph's

That might  have  been  the  end  of  the  story,  but  for  a  hugely loyal and rapidly growing readership that built up in the six  weeks after  the  site  was  launched, so  I  decided  not  only  to keep  BootLog going,  but  to  allow  it  to expand, and see what happens.

It has been a runaway success and this web site now contains the complete Boot Camp, F!F!F!, Over 2 You and Top Tips Archives, links to freeware and shareware utilities that have proved useful over the  years  and  the  BootLog  Glossary  explaining hundreds of common PC,  computer,  network  and Internet  terms. 

That  was  just  the  beginning,  though  and  BootLog is now evolving, primarily as a UK based resource for PC owners but also  as a repository for my personal archives, which cover more than 30 years in journalism and consumer electronics. I have several reasons for wanting to do this.

Putting my work on the web forces me to bring order to the chaos that is my filing system (basically piles of stuff all over the place...) hopefully making it easier for me to access.

Much of what I have written in the last three decades will have disappeared into landfill and the ether. The web will ensure that at  least  some  of  it  remains accessible for as long as I stump up for web space (and the good people at Google choose to cache it on their servers). There's a bit more about me and what I do Here

I'm  also  hopeful  there are a few people out there  who,  like  me, find the recent history of electronics and technology fascinating and compelling. I would hate for those early,  exciting days to be forgotten.

I was privileged to have witnessed the development of and quite often been at the launch, written about and reviewed many of today's most important and influential  consumer technologies  of  the  last  three  decades. These include the VCR, home  computers, camcorders, video games, the Walkman Tape and digital), Prestel, Teletext, mobile phones, Laservision, CD, Video CD, DVD HD DVD, Blu Ray, NICAM, digital radio and television, satellite TV, widescreen and High Definition TV, GPS and of course the Internet, to name just a few...

It's easy to take today's slick, click-and-it-happens technology for  granted, but  as my recollection and records show, it  wasn't  always  that  way...

BootLog is a work in progress now amounting to well over 2000 articles. Eventually the database will contain more than 4000 items, covering computing, home video, home cinema, satellite television, security and surveillance, from the technology's first faltering steps to the present day

The site is now being updated on a daily basis with new content and features so please bookmark the BootLog Home page and come back soon.

Thank  you for looking and see you again I hope!

Rick Maybury

Update May 2006

BootLog is changing. The Software and Top Tips sections have been given their own website, called PCTopTips. The new look pages will be better indexed and organised, to make it easier to find specific items. BootLog, meanwhile will continue as before, as an archive and a home for all of my other files. Hopefully the changes will be seamless so you shouldn't notice any major differences.

Rick