What's New at the Brewery...

The Brewery information server was aggressively maintained and changed on an almost daily basis. Unfortunately, the pace has slowed substantially. This list describes some of the major enhancements as they occur.

September 2007: I'm sorry Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that...

The Brewery server, after serving sorta faithfully these ten long years, has refused to start its network services. I knew it was coming - the old beast was getting pretty cranky.

Rather than expend more effort resurrecting 1997 technology, I've decided instead to finish moving The Brewery - lock, stock and barrel - onto the new HBD box. To you, faithful Brewery fans, this means the following:

The Gambrinus Mug submission engine wil not be available antil I get the few moments I need to locallize the code - it still "thinks" it is on the old box.
I will need to manually bring some data from the old box over to the new box to ensure all updates which had neen made since the last port of The Brewery to the HBD box are brought on board.
I will be dependent on Brewery users to report links that no longer work, etc.

Hopefully, things will slow down enough soon so that I can get this done within reasonable time. In any case, asn as usual: please bear with me.

December 2005: So long, and thanks for all the fish...

Well, since the maintenance of the Supplier List and the Club List was becoming increasingly a burden (far more "they're no longer there, please remove them" requests than the converse...), they have been removed from the site. Google is better at revealing suppliers on the net, and your phone book or local brew club will probably be far more adept at ensuring that the suppliers they direct you to in your locale are still open for business. The AHA offers a fairly well maintained and comprehensive club listing on their site, www.beertown.org.

December 2005: So long, and thanks for all the fish...

May 2005: And the beat goes on...

The server The Brewery is getting increasingly flakey, though I did manage to revive it today when it stopped serving HTML documents. I also managed to fix the Gambrinus Mug submission engine (Hooorah!). Lord knows how long THAT one's been down - folks, please feel free to notify me at

May 2004: Upgrade of Brews & Views

With the crash of the HBD May 14, 2004, and subsequent issues getting the Brews & Views BBS back online, I've decided to simply upgrade the software it runs on to the lates version (Discus 4.0) rather than screw around with getting a new piece of software to run it on. Seems to be working nicely. Check it out: http://hbd.org/cgi-bin/discus/discus.cgi

March 2004: Sponsorship of The Brewery

After the Funding Snafu of 2004, it was decided to break the Brewery away from the HBD and have it seek its own sponsor. As a result, a banner is being placed at the head of each page, and the pages are also being reformatted to the HBD's 640 column design. On the way, as a side benefit, I am updating some links, etc.

December 2003: HBD -> Brewery link disabled

After numerous complaints regarding broken links after a security update to the server, the HTML feed into brewery.org from hbd.org has been removed. If you were accessing brewery.org content as http://hbd.org/brewery/..., you will have to update your links to be http://brewery.org/...

August 2003: Karl has retired.

After dedicating most of his spare time to the Brewery over the past ten years or so, Karl has succumbed to the demands of his family, career, and the desire to have a life. For better or for worse, the Brewery is Pat's baby, now. He promises to get to things as they are brought to his attention (when things break), to add things submitted for the Clubs list and suppliers list as time allows. Bear with. And if you do have a problem on the Brewery, please document the URL and avoid general grunts like "are you ever going to update the supplier list". Need data, folks. Only you can prevent Janitor burnout...

November 1999: Major updates and changes in the works!

In the past couple of years the "aggressively maintained" aspect of The Brewery has sort of slid to the back burner. We apologize for this and are under a complete renovation campaign. The entire site is going to get a good work over. Bad links out. New and exciting links and information in. We've started with the look of the front page and will be working our way down the major sections of the board. Please bear with us as we go through some major renovations. Thank you.

January 1998: Brewery now part of the Homebrew Digest server

Since much The Brewery grew out of the Homebrew Digest, and the two are essentially a part of one another, The Brewery and the Homebrew Digest are now together on the same system

May 27, 1997: Cats Meow

Users who want to download the entire Cats Meow recipe collection and print it out can now do so. The downloadable version of Cats Meow 3 is in Adobe Acrobat format rather than the PostScript format used for previous versions. Acrobat is cross-platform portable and more familiar to PC users. Questions or comments should be sent to Mark Stevens, stevens@stsci.edu. You can access downloadable version now.

March 12, 1997: Recipator

An interactive spreadsheet by Mark Riley to aid in designing your recipes.

December 18, 1996: Gambrinus' Mug

We have added a new, interactive database for homebrew recipes. No longer is it up to just Mark and Karl to add recipes. Users can upload recipes into the database and have them online instantly. Go to Gambrinus' Mug.

December 2, 1996: Lots of stuff...

The Cats Meow area now has over 1,000 recipes in it, so it's time to get the scripts working to generate the downloadable version. Might be able to get this done by Christmas if I can find some free time...
Lots of new things in the Library area too, including a cool description of building a cider press (this was a bit old, and a user passed it on to us). There are also a bunch of new links to documents on remote sites.
The host server also got an upgrade so things like searches are faster than ever. We're now averaging over 40,000 accesses per day.

October 15, 1996: Cats Meow Improvements

The table of contents generator, which had been broken for the past 4 months, is now working again. It's also been enhanced to add tags for "extract" or "all-grain" processes next to every recipe listed on the contents pages---should make it really easy to use just the kind of recipes you want to see! Go to Cats Meow.

October 12, 1996: Bulletin Board

At the request of Brewery users, a new area was added for chatting about homebrew-related issues. Post questions and answers. Check out the Bulletin Board.

September 14, 1996: Cats Meow 3

About another 30 recipes were added in...count is now about 950 recipes online.

June 13, 1996: Brewing Lambics

Jim Liddil gave a talk at the 1996 AHA conference on brewing lambic beers. Here are his notes.

June 7, 1996: Homebrew Digest Online

Karl installed a filter that converts Homebrew Digest to a browsable hypertext form. Links mentioned in the text get translated to live links too. This has been moved to the The Homebrew Digest's host so all is under one roof.

April 23, 1996: New stuff...

Some new software in the Online Resources page, including a new version of the BrewNIX recipe formulator and a new program called AALoss that calculates alpha acid loss due to storing hops. Some new stuff in the Technical Library and Tap Room areas too, including the text of the latest BJCP Program Guide.

April 7, 1996: Minor maintenance changes

A few new items in the Technical Library, some new competitions and clubs on the ClubNet page, etc. A few new things worth checking out: Several new programs on the Online Resources page, including a water chemistry program by Ken Schwartz. Some new things on the Library page too including a discussion of early wort hopping posted by Dave Draper and a very cool discussion of building an electric brew bucket, posted by Ken Schwartz. Check 'em out!

Note that we're always looking for new ideas and resources, especially if you'd like to get involved in setting up new services and resources. If you have a good idea, please send us a note.

Back to the Brewery

MAS, 5/27/97