~hedy's blogroll - BlogFlock

P&B: Frills - Manuel Moreale RSS Feed

2025-04-25T11:00:00.000Z

This is the 87th edition of People and Blogs, the series where I ask interesting people to talk about themselves and their blogs. Today we have Frills and her blog, frills.dev

To follow this series subscribe to the newsletter. A new interview will land in your inbox every Friday. Not a fan of newsletters? No problem! You can read the interviews here on the blog or you can subscribe to the RSS feed.

If you're enjoying the People and Blogs series and you want to see it grow, consider supporting on Ko-Fi.

Let's start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

Hello! I'm Frills. I'm a frontend developer and accessibility specialist. I live in Wales with my fiancé and my dog. I write blog posts that vary between 'should be a toot' and 'random thing you might like' to developer (mostly a11y) tips or how-tos.

At university, I studied Digital Media, which covered various digital topics like web design, game and 3D technology and ethics. I already had a foundation of knowledge from being self-taught, so university was a way for me to gather soft skills in teamwork, critical thinking and mentorship. In my second year, I signed up as a Peer Assisted Learning leader, to help the first years in their learning. This is where I found my joy in mentoring and teaching the uninitiated.

I'm just under a decade on from leaving university with a First degree, with 3 years of being on the Dean's list. I have had a few roles in different types of organisations, from a One Man Band to a higher education institution.

I spent a few years working in the public sector just around the time that the UK law was changing to include web accessibility in the Equality Act. There was a knowledge gap in my team, and we had plenty of CPD time whilst waiting for red tape approvals so that I could attend webinars and read resources to fill that gap.
My interest and knowledge in web accessibility has gone from strength to strength, I value semantic coding and not reinventing the wheel.

Away from a screen, I have a rotation of hobbies that I slip in and out of. Crafting is a big thread that has stayed with me throughout my life. I like to draw, paint, make with my hands. I sometimes get into reading for a few months, then don't pick up a fictional book for a whole year. I love spring, and the awakening of the summer months, walking in woods and paddling in the sea with my Labrador, Orla.

What's the story behind your blog?

For most of my life, I have had a website, whether that was on social media or WordPress or Blogger or something, but in 2023 I came across Localghost's website and was so inspired by the sprawling links upon links of people who made up the Indie Web, that I felt compelled to join in.

I'd tried many times before to have a Professional Website And Blog, but it always felt forced and insincere. I never wanted to make solely developer-based content, so when I found out that personal blogs were still alive, I was so inspired.

I blog under the pseudonymous name of Frills, and the origin is pretty nerdy: I was a World of Warcraft player for several years, and my main was a gnome mage named Frills.

It stuck and became my go-to username for gamer tags and online silly things and so.. this silly little website with its silly little blog became an extension of my silly little wow character.

Since its inception, the homepage has gone through a proper glow-up. Though where it is now feels right and I'll probably only make small tweaks over time. I collated a bunch of screenshots to archive how it got to where it is on my blog post A whole year on the Indie Web

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

I'm the least organised person when it comes to processes with my blog.

I'm more of a numbers and paint kinda gal than a wordsmith and I am very aware of this.

Most of the time I lean into this, uh.. personality, and write as though it's a diary, but other times I'll try and over-engineer the wording to make it sound flowery and fun. I am not consistent 😄

Depending on the topic, whether it's an opinion piece or how much I already know about it, I will do some light-medium research to fact-check or grab imagery or quotes from others or online sources.

I'm a bit rough and ready, to be honest, I'll have an idea, focus until it's written, and then publish it before I change my mind. I usually have to go back and do edits as I don't get people to proof it for me aha.

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

My ideal creative environment with writing specifically is: Be alone.

I get distracted by my environment easily. If there is someone else around, my attention is halved, even if they aren't directly interacting with me.

I believe that being comfortable in a space, whatever that looks like for you, is the most important thing. For me, that is:

Having a quiet space (or a way to make it quiet, i.e. headphones with noise cancelling)
Being warm, not in a breeze unless I am roasting.
Having nice socks on
Having a drink to hand (usually a cup of tea)
Making sure I don't need a wee

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

My blog is hosted on Neocities. I love the community. I love that it makes your island of a website feel less isolated.

I use Eleventy static site generator to create webpages from markdown files. I love markdown! It helps you focus on the structure of your blog post.

I use CSS intentionally, I wanted to get back to basics after years of using compiled languages like Sass.

To handle duplicate code chunks like the main menu and the footer, I use Nunjucks templating. It provides a nice layer of logic and looping and includes and it's really nice to use 😊

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

I'd want to sort tagging posts properly. Structure my folders to go year/month/post-name. I used a date system (like 201231-post-name) and I think it's a really ugly URL. I've started structuring my content like that now, but I have a whole load of legacy posts that are stuck in that formation.

I'd probably stick with Eleventy, and I would definitely still be called Frills 😊

From the design side, I would forgo trying to use CSS grid to structure the layout. I don't really like how I have implemented it, but it's so ingrained now, it'll be a bit piece of work to update it.

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what's your position on people monetising personal blogs?

I donate $5 a month to Neocities as a supporter, this gives me access to more file types and a custom domain. I am happy with this setup as I like to support Neocities and the community within it. My domain costs ummmm, I think it's a tenner a year. So $70 (£54.10) annually.

I don't generate any revenue with my blog. I may open a Ko-fi or tip jar or something where people can tip if they want, but I'd never charge people to read my brain farts.

I have no position on people monetising blogs. Like, you do you. Sure, I find recipe blogs super annoying because you have to trawl through personal backstories and ads to find the recipe, but people gotta pay their bills.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

Cassidy Williams - She's already been interviewed for P&B, but Cassidy was an early inspiration for me as a baby dev. I remember seeing her do a live coding session at a conference in London and I left absolutely buzzing.
Una - Another early dev inspiration.
Xandra - Founder of 32 Bit Cafe, a wonderful indie web community.
Mike from No Happy Nonsense - his brain is incredible. You start reading a normal, regular article then it slowly descends into absurdity.
Goth Hoblin - A very good friend, old colleague, and incredible TTRPG writer. Hire her to write you stuff!! Or just check out her games and resources.
Owain - Ow is a fountain of enthusiasm and knowledge, we're old colleagues too. He's an Umbraco developer and AFOL. Talks about Umbraco, and work-life balance and has an awesome Wiki.

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

I'm working on releasing an Envelope Escape Room that I made for my mum but can be played by anyone who loves puzzles. Keep your eyes on my blog feed to find out how to get hold of it when it's released!
Otherwise, here is a list of lovely things I watch and listen to on the reg:

This was the 87th edition of People and Blogs. Hope you enjoyed this interview with Frills. Make sure to follow her blog (RSS) and get in touch with her if you have any questions.

Awesome supporters

You can support this series on Ko-Fi and all supporters will be listed here as well as on the official site of the newsletter.

Jamie Thingelstad (RSS) — Piet Terheyden — Eleonora — Carl Barenbrug (RSS) — Steve Ledlow (RSS) — Paolo Ruggeri (RSS) — Nicolas Magand (RSS) — Rob Hope — Chris Hannah (RSS) — Pedro Corá (RSS) — Sixian Lim (RSS) — Matt Stein (RSS) — Winnie Lim (RSS) — Flamed (RSS) — C Jackdaw (RSS) — Fabricio Teixeira (RSS) — Rosalind Croad — Mike Walsh (RSS) — Markus Heurung (RSS) — Michael Warren (RSS) — Chuck Grimmett (RSS) — Robin Harford (RSS) — Bryan Maniotakis (RSS) — Barry Hess (RSS) — Ivan Moreale — Ben Werdmuller (RSS) — Cory Gibbons — Luke Harris (RSS) — Lars-Christian Simonsen (RSS) — Cody Schultz — Brad Barrish (RSS) — Nikita Galaiko — Erik Blankvoort — Jaga Santagostino — Andrew Zuckerman — Mattia Compagnucci (RSS) — Thord D. Hedengren (RSS) — Fabien Sauser (RSS) — Maxwell Omdal — Jarrod Blundy (RSS) — Andrea Contino (RSS) — Sebastian De Deyne (RSS) — Nicola Losito (RSS) — Lou Plummer (RSS) — Leon Mika (RSS) — Veronique (RSS) — Neil Gorman (RSS) — Reaper (RSS) — Matt Rutherford (RSS) — Aleem Ali (RSS) — Nikkin (RSS) — Hans (RSS) — Matt Katz (RSS) — Ilja Panić — Emmanuel Odongo — Peter Rukavina (RSS) — James (RSS) — Adam Keys (RSS) — Alexey Staroselets (RSS) — John L — Minsuk Kang (RSS) — Naz Hamid (RSS) — Ken Zinser (RSS) — Jan — Grey Vugrin (RSS) — Luigi Mozzillo (RSS) — Alex Hyett (RSS) — Andy Piper — Hrvoje Šimić (RSS) — Travis Schmeisser — Doug Jones — Vincent Ritter (RSS) — Shen — Fabian Holzer (RSS) — Courtney (RSS) — Dan Ritz (RSS) — Jeremy Bassetti (RSS) — Luke Dorny — Thomas Erickson — Herman Martinus (RSS) — Benny (RSS) — Annie Mueller (RSS) — SekhmetDesign — Gui (RSS) — Jamie (RSS) — Juha Liikala (RSS) — Ray (RSS) — Chad Moore (RSS) — Benjamin Wittorf (RSS) — Prabash Livera — BinaryDigit (RSS) — Radek Kozieł (RSS) — Marcus Richardson — Emily Moran Barwick (RSS) — Zach Barocas (RSS) — Gosha (RSS) — Ruben Arakelyan (RSS) — Manton Reece (RSS) — Silvano Stralla (RSS) — Mario Figueroa — Benjamin Chait (RSS) — Cai Wingfield — Pete (RSS) — Pete Millspaugh (RSS) — Martin Matanovic (RSS) — Coinciding Narratives (RSS) — Arun Venkatesan (RSS)

Want to support P&B?

If you like this series and want to help it grow, you can:

support on Ko-Fi;
post about it on your own blog and let your readers know about its existence;
email me comments and feedback on the series;
suggest a person to interview next. I'm especially interested in people and blogs outside the tech/web bubble.

Thank you for keeping RSS alive. You're awesome.

Email me :: Sign my guestbook :: Support for 1$/month :: See my generous supporters :: Subscribe to People and Blogs

Friday, April 25, 2025 - Baty.net

2025-04-25T09:35:56.000Z

Yeah, I’ve been distracted by a couple of new static blogging tools. I think both are interesting and worth a serious look by anyone looking for simple, local-first, Markdown-based blogging. I’ll try to write a bit more detail about them, but for now, check them out yourself. BSSG is a complete static site generator written in Bash. The only dependency is a markdown processor. Cmark is recommended and simple. I use Pandoc. It’s simple, fast enough, and has a refreshingly easy to use theming system with a ton of built-in themes. Then there’s LMNO.lol, which is even easier. Create a single Markdown file with all your posts, then just drag and drop the file into lmno.lol and boom! you have a blog. This one is a hosted service. Check them out! I did: linux.baty.net and baty.blog are BSSG blogs and lmno.lol/jbaty is at lmno.lol.

Fixing the mind - Manuel Moreale RSS Feed

2025-04-25T06:00:00.000Z

I’ve come to the conclusion that my current mental state is fucked up in all sorts of ways for a variety of different reasons. The thing that sucks the most about mental health is that it’s usually not something like a broken leg where you immediately notice something is wrong. Rather, it’s a slow-moving process and you have time to adapt and accept that how you feel is in fact normal and you slowly adapt to your new reality. But my current reality is not normal something has to change.

There are many paths to take in order to fix a mind that is not in its best shape and I’m gonna start with one I’m familiar with and that’s meditation. I’ve been interested in meditation for at least 20 years and I’ve practised it on and off for almost as long. But I always looked at it as something I wanted to do while now I see it as something I have to do. And so back on the cushion we go.

The good thing is that I have easy ways to track my progress and so I’ll try to share how the journey goes. Because—and this is related to something else I’m gonna write about—the journey is what matters.

Thank you for keeping RSS alive. You're awesome.

Email me :: Sign my guestbook :: Support for 1$/month :: See my generous supporters :: Subscribe to People and Blogs

Wednesday, April 23, 2025 - Baty.net

2025-04-23T23:35:17.000Z

I posted the same thing on three different blogs today, just for fun.

All three of them were fun to do, which is why I keep so many blogs going at once.

Consolidating my email handling in Emacs - Baty.net

2025-04-23T19:53:05.000Z

If I were to only have one computer, I’d use notmuch for email in Emacs. I might also import non-email stuff as notmuch messages so I can search everything in one place.

But, I now have 3 computers; 2 running macOS and one running (Fedora) Linux. Notmuch takes too much of my energy to keep synced between machines. So what about Mu4e? Mu4e is probably the “nicest” Emacs package for managing email, but it still requires a local synced copy of all my messages. This means configuring mbsync on all machines, etc.

It’s a lot, so I’ve decided to “simplify” things and use Gnus exclusively for email in Emacs. Gnus is weird and hard to get ones head around, but it’s built-in and it only requires a ~/.gnus.el file on each machine. Gnus works directly with my email service’s IMAP back end, so everything is the same everywhere, without having to think about it.

I don’t get the fancy search features of notmuch, and I don’t get an offline copy of my email store. Honestly, having local email is one of those “but what if…?” things that never need an answer.

With Gnus, I get fewer dependencies and not nearly as many “How do I keep this all in order?” issues.

More breaking changes in Hugo - Baty.net

2025-04-22T10:01:32.000Z

Hugo is actively developed and still gets a lot of attention. This is fine. What’s not fine is that it seems like every third update introduces breaking changes.

I updated to 0.146.5 and my site failed to build. This was a theme thing, and thankfully the theme maintainer was on it. Still annoying.

I like using Hugo and I like my theme and I like having a static website. What I don’t like is not knowing if things are going to still work next week.

I don’t want to migrate to something else…again…but I’m thinking about it.

Friday, April 18, 2025 - Baty.net

2025-04-18T12:05:22.000Z

I’m rarely in a hurry, so why do I spend so much time working on ways to do things faster? Working on the Linux laptop this week has made so many things slower. I don’t have a text expansion utility configured yet. I don’t have something like Raycast on the Mac. Still, I don’t feel like I’m doing less. In fact, my mind has been calmer. Writing on the ThinkPad feels more like using a typewriter. OK, that’s an exaggeration, but you see the point. There’s much less going on, here. I have the usual urge to “improve” things, but I may just wait a minute on that and see if I can settle in with something simpler.

P&B: Jeremy Keith - Manuel Moreale RSS Feed

2025-04-18T11:00:00.000Z

This is the 86th edition of People and Blogs, the series where I ask interesting people to talk about themselves and their blogs. Today we have Jeremy Keith and his blog, adactio.com

If you're enjoying the People and Blogs series and you want to see it grow, consider supporting on Ko-Fi.

Let's start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

My name is Jeremy Keith. I’m from Ireland. Cork, like. Now I live in Brighton on the south coast of England.

I play traditional Irish music on the mandolin. I also play bouzouki in the indie rock band Salter Cane.

I also make websites. I made a community website all about traditional Irish music that’s been going for decades. It’s called The Session.

Back in 2005 I co-founded a design agency called Clearleft. It’s still going strong twenty years later (I mean, as strong as any agency can be going in these volatile times).

Oh, and I’ve written some nerdy books about making websites. The one I’m most proud of is called Resilient Web Design.

What's the story behind your blog?

I was living in Freiburg in southern Germany in the 1990s. That’s when I started making websites. My first ever website was for a band I was playing in at the time. My second ever website was for someone else’s band. Then I figured I should have my own website.

I didn’t want the domain name to be in German but I also didn’t want it to be in English. So I got adactio.com.

To begin with, it wasn’t a blog. It was more of a portfolio-type professional site. Although if you look at it now, it looks anything other than professional. Would ya look at that—the frameset still works!

Anyway, after moving to Brighton at the beginning of the 21st century, I decided I wanted to have one of those blogs that all the cool kids had. I thought I was very, very late to the game. This was in November 2001. That’s when I started my blog, though I just called it (and continue to call it) a journal.

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

Sometimes a thing will pop into my head and I’ll blog it straight away. More often, it bounces around inside my skull for a while. Sometimes it’s about spotting connections, like if if I’ve linked to a few different things that have some kind of connective thread, I’ll blog in order to point out the connections.

I never write down those things bouncing around in my head. I know I probably should. But then if I’m going to take the time to write down an idea for a blog post, I might as well write the blog post itself.

I never write drafts. I just publish. I can always go back and fix any mistakes later. The words are written on the web, not carved in stone.

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

I mostly just blog from home, sitting at my laptop like I’m doing now. I have no idea whether there’s any connection between physical space and writing. That said, I do like writing on trains.

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

I use my own hand-rolled hodge-podge of PHP and MySQL that could only very generously be described as a content management system. It works for me. It might not be the most powerful system, but it’s fairly simple. I like having control over everything. If there’s some feature I want, it’s up to me to add it.

So yeah, it’s a nice boring LAMP stack—Linux Apache MySQL PHP. It’s currently hosted on Digital Ocean. I use DNSimple for all the DNS stuff and Fastmail for my email. I like keeping those things separate so that I don’t have a single point of failure.

I realise this all makes me sound kind of paranoid, but when you’ve been making websites for as long as I have, you come to understand that you can’t rely on anything sticking around in the long term so a certain amount of paranoia is justified.

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

I’m not sure. I’m not entirely comfortable about using a database. It feels more fragile than just having static files. But I do cache the blog posts as static HTML too, so I’m not entirely reliant on the database. And having a database allows me to do fun relational stuff like search.

If I were starting from scratch, I probably wouldn’t end up making the same codebase I’ve got now, but I almost certainly would still be aiming to keep it as simple as possible. Cleverness isn’t good for code in the long term.

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what's your position on people monetising personal blogs?

I’ve got hosting costs but that’s pretty much it. I don’t make any money from my website.

That Irish traditional music website I mentioned, The Session, that does accept donations to cover the costs. As well as hosting, there’s a newsletter to pay for, and third-party mapping services.

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

You should absolutely check out Walknotes by Denise Wilton.

It’s about going out in the morning to pick up litter before work. From that simple premise you get some of the most beautiful writing on the web. Every week there’s a sentence that just stops me in my tracks. I love it.

We wife, Jessica Spengler, also has a wonderful blog, but I would say that, wouldn’t I?

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

You know I mentioned that The Session is funded by donations? Well, actually, this month—April 2025—any donations go towards funding something different; bursary sponsorship places for young musicians to attend workshops at the Belfest Trad Fest who otherwise wouldn’t be able to go:

thesession.org/donate

So if you’ve ever liked something I’ve written on my blog, you can thank me by contributing a little something to that.

Cheers,
Jeremy

This was the 86th edition of People and Blogs. Hope you enjoyed this interview with Jeremy. Make sure to follow his blog (RSS) and get in touch with him if you have any questions.

Awesome supporters

You can support this series on Ko-Fi and all supporters will be listed here as well as on the official site of the newsletter.

Jamie Thingelstad (RSS) — Piet Terheyden — Eleonora — Carl Barenbrug (RSS) — Steve Ledlow (RSS) — Paolo Ruggeri (RSS) — Nicolas Magand (RSS) — Rob Hope — Chris Hannah (RSS) — Pedro Corá (RSS) — Sixian Lim (RSS) — Matt Stein (RSS) — Winnie Lim (RSS) — Flamed (RSS) — C Jackdaw (RSS) — Fabricio Teixeira (RSS) — Rosalind Croad — Mike Walsh (RSS) — Markus Heurung (RSS) — Michael Warren (RSS) — Chuck Grimmett (RSS) — Robin Harford (RSS) — Bryan Maniotakis (RSS) — Barry Hess (RSS) — Ivan Moreale — Ben Werdmuller (RSS) — Cory Gibbons — Luke Harris (RSS) — Lars-Christian Simonsen (RSS) — Cody Schultz — Brad Barrish (RSS) — Nikita Galaiko — Erik Blankvoort — Jaga Santagostino — Andrew Zuckerman — Mattia Compagnucci (RSS) — Thord D. Hedengren (RSS) — Fabien Sauser (RSS) — Maxwell Omdal — Numeric Citizen (RSS) — Jarrod Blundy (RSS) — Andrea Contino (RSS) — Sebastian De Deyne (RSS) — Nicola Losito (RSS) — Lou Plummer (RSS) — Leon Mika (RSS) — Veronique (RSS) — Neil Gorman (RSS) — Reaper (RSS) — Matt Rutherford (RSS) — Aleem Ali (RSS) — Nikkin (RSS) — Hans (RSS) — Matt Katz (RSS) — Ilja Panić — Emmanuel Odongo — Peter Rukavina (RSS) — James (RSS) — Adam Keys (RSS) — Alexey Staroselets (RSS) — John L — Minsuk Kang (RSS) — Naz Hamid (RSS) — Ken Zinser (RSS) — Jan — Grey Vugrin (RSS) — Luigi Mozzillo (RSS) — Alex Hyett (RSS) — Andy Piper — Hrvoje Šimić (RSS) — Travis Schmeisser — Doug Jones — Vincent Ritter (RSS) — Shen — Fabian Holzer (RSS) — Courtney (RSS) — Jeremy Bassetti (RSS) — Luke Dorny — Thomas Erickson — Herman Martinus (RSS) — Benny (RSS) — Annie Mueller (RSS) — SekhmetDesign — Gui (RSS) — Jamie (RSS) — Juha Liikala (RSS) — Ray (RSS) — Chad Moore (RSS) — Benjamin Wittorf (RSS) — Prabash Livera — BinaryDigit (RSS) — Radek Kozieł (RSS) — Marcus Richardson — Emily Moran Barwick (RSS) — Zach Barocas (RSS) — Gosha (RSS) — Ruben Arakelyan (RSS) — Manton Reece (RSS) — Silvano Stralla (RSS) — Mario Figueroa — Benjamin Chait (RSS) — Cai Wingfield

Want to support P&B?

If you like this series and want to help it grow, you can:

support on Ko-Fi;
post about it on your own blog and let your readers know about its existence;
email me comments and feedback on the series;
suggest a person to interview next. I'm especially interested in people and blogs outside the tech/web bubble.

Thank you for keeping RSS alive. You're awesome.

Email me :: Sign my guestbook :: Support for 1$/month :: See my generous supporters :: Subscribe to People and Blogs

Thursday, April 17, 2025 - Baty.net

2025-04-17T17:38:44.000Z

I’ve been busy with my Linux experiment. I’m writing about it there, if you want to follow along.

Today, I put a Framework laptop in my cart. This whole experiment only got rolling because I thought I might like Linux on my desktop, so why am I looking at laptops when I have a perfectly servicable (2015) ThinkPad X1 Carbon (that I’m typing on right now)? I can’t explain it. Most likely it’s because I have an Apple Studio Display and (I’m told) it’s quite challenging to use it with Linux. I’m not changing monitors for this, the Studio Display is too good (and expensive).

FiiO CP13 Portable Cassette Player - Baty.net

2025-04-15T16:46:04.000Z

Nostalgia is some powerful stuff, ain’t it?

My old Nakamichi cassette deck stopped working a few years ago, and I never bothered to replace it. I’ve been into vinyl and still have a good CD transport, so I didn’t see a need for cassettes.

Occasionally, though, I’ll spot a cassette somewhere and think I might like to bring mine out and play them. I didn’t want some ancient “vintage” cassette deck, and I didn’t want to spend much.

Enter the FiiO CP13.

FiiO CP13 and Deep Purple

I impulse ordered one after watching someone review theirs on YouTube or somewhere. “I NEED THAT!” I said :).

It arrived, so I quickly went to grab my 1980s cassette case with all my cassettes. Except I couldn’t find it. I looked everywhere. Nothing. All I found was a tote back with a dozen or so “rejects”. Tapes I’d recorded myself, broken tapes, or just things I stopped liking.

Now, I know I wouldn’t throw away my tapes, so I’m sure it’ll turn up. In the meantime, I’m entertaining myself with the rejects. This meant fixing the ones I have. All of my cassettes are at least 40 years old. The problem I see most is missing pressure pads. I ordered a fix-it kit from Amazon and set to repairing what I could.

Fixing what I can.

I’m listening to a bunch of Aerosmith tracks I recorded off something in 1980.

I can’t tell you how the player sounds, because my tapes are in such poor shape that it’s impossible to know if it’s the player or the tape. What I will say that I’m having a blast with it.

Earliest memory of coffee - James' Coffee Blog

2025-04-15T11:03:00.000Z

Ruben invited me to participate in a blog questions challenge, noting:

I suspect James would find one of these viral blog series easier if it were about books and/or coffee, but I’m tagging him here! He may do with this as he wishes.

This inspired me to think of what a “coffee questions challenge” would look like ¹. What questions would I like to answer about coffee? A few ideas to mind, but one question I came up with had particular resonance particular interest: What is your earliest memory of coffee?

What is your earliest memory of coffee?

When I was young, I loved going to cafes with my family. We would go after going shopping sometimes, or after visiting a museum. We wouldn’t go often, but every time we did was special. When I was really young, I would get about juice carton and a cake, maybe an ice lolly. I think I liked apple juice the best. My family would have tea and a cake or a scone.

As I got older, I wanted to try scones. They are now one of my favourite things to have in a cafe, a real afternoon tea treat. My favourite flavour is scones served with lemon curd. These are few and far between: only one place we visited served them. I wonder if they still do.

That is not a story about coffee, but I thought it would be fun to share! I didn’t really know anything about coffee at the time.

In my early teenage years, I tried coffee for the first time. My dad made me my first cup. It was a small cup served with lots of milk and sugar. It was not exactly to my taste. I vaguely recall being excited to try it but leaving most of the cup. A few years later, I started to drink more tea: breakfast, lunch and, at one point, just before bed. I loved and love tea.

I then went on to drink Nescafé coffee, black. I still drink mostly black coffee today. While I prefer speciality beans now, I never turn down a coffee. Especially when it is made by someone for you.

Your turn

If the question interests you, I would love to read your response to the question: What is your earliest memory of coffee? If you write a response, please do let me know.

On the topic of television, I keep a list of TV shows I have watched and enjoyed at https://jamesg.blog/tv-shows.

[↩]

Gardening, fruit and Nature with Sara and James - James' Coffee Blog

2025-04-14T21:05:00.000Z

In today’s world, it is becoming more and more important to be embodied in the place we live in. To experience the changing of the season, the rhythms of nature. To feel the experience of place to our last nerve. And what is more indicative of nature as it exists in a certain place than gardening and the local food and the culture surrounding it.

And how does it change with the 1,000 miles between places?

Sara and James spent the evening reflecting on what gardening – and, by extension, Nature – means to both of them. From stories of gardening as a child to documenting the fruits commonly grown between Scotland and Slovenia and Croatia, we explore our connection to the places in which we live.

Their discussion is published below.

What fruits are commonly grown where you live?

James:

Summer berries are a highlight of the year – raspberries, blueberries, strawberries. A summer treat at the heart of British culture is strawberries and cream, often promoted at the Wimbledon tennis tournament.

Among my favourite fruits are blackcurrants and gooseberries. My grandparents grow both in their garden – they have a few small bushes of each. The blackcurrants were a favourite of mine. The home-made blackcurrant and gooseberry jelly was particularly delicious – always a real treat. You can also get “jostaberries” which are a cross between blackcurrants and gooseberries. Those are amazing, too.

I think we grow apples. They certainly can grow here. Although, growing up, the main type of apples I knew grown in gardens were “cooking apples” – the kind you would use to make a jam or a pie. I’m still not sure of the difference, but I’m sure there is one!

Out in the countryside, there are orchards to which you can go and pick fruit. I should go this year. Although I admit I would probably end up eating a lot of fruit!

Although we grow a lot of fruit, we import a lot of fruits from other countries – especially tropical fruits like mangos and pineapples and coconuts. I think we don’t grow enough blueberries to meet our demand – many have to be imported from elsewhere.

My favourite fruits are those fresh from the garden. Maybe one day I will start a garden.

I am surprised and delighted by how kiwis and lemons grow in Slovenia, as Sara notes. I don’t think these grow in the UK. I wonder if these fruits could grow in the UK with our climate. As I write, I realise how much I have to learn about fruits – and also the joy of learning what is grown in different places around the world.

I also had no idea that nuts were grown in Slovenia. I don’t know if nuts are grown here in the UK. This is bringing back memories of eating nuts with family by the fireplace. I think writing about Nature and reminiscing, combined with the discussion-like form of writing, is helping me recall old memories I haven’t thought about in years.

Sara also notes that kaki – or what we could call persimmons in the UK – are grown where she lives. I have never tried one, although I am curious! Next time I see one I will have to give it a go.

Sara:

If I had to pick one to eat, it would probably be apples. But we also produce a lot of grapes, plums and pears, all of which are connected to the alcohol making (and we are proud of our alcohol). We have celebrations for cherries and peaches as well. The blueberries and blackberries picking in nature are like a national sport, along with the mushrooms, but then mushrooms are not fruits. We also pick a lot of walnuts and hazelnuts and even more important chestnuts, which are again not fruits. In certain regions, the olives are one of the most important trees.

Otherwise people grow a lot of fruit. We have different berries from gooseberries, raspberries, currant, kiwi, kaki, greengage (not sure about this translation, since they are usually not green), mandarin, oranges, lemons, (I have troubles remembering all of them, but they are a lot)

At my Ljubljana’s house, we have apple and plum trees. We used to have more trees, but people wanted more space for houses and cars. I miss the bigger garden we used to have. And at the seaside we have the permissions, cherries, lemon, mandarin, oranges, figs, olives, plum, peach, apricot and I have probably forgotten some. Some were planted in the last couple of years, and I did not harvest enough fruit from them to remember it. There are also grapes and kiwi, but these are not really trees.

As for James’ comment, there are a lot of different types of apples, and while I have zero idea which ones are for cooking, there are generally varieties based on the fitness and sweetness and sourness - we usually use the sour firm ones for cooking.

I am also surprised that they have orchards, when they can go pick the fruits. If we have them here, they are not popular. Usually it is small farms having their trees and then they ask family, friends and acquaintances to help pick them up the fruit. Or in some cases, ask the neighbors to help themselves. Maybe having good market places with fresh fruit and vegetables everywhere means that there is not a lot of demand for it?

We also import fruit, including some that we grow here as well. One can taste the difference though. Still, when it comes to the mandarins, they have to be from the Neretva, which is a region of Croatia. Everybody will try to advertise as this one, because some would only buy from there.

We always produce more permission than we eat, especially since three out of the four trees we have are not vanilla. I wish they would survive the post, as then I would be able to send you some to try, James. But by the time they are edible, they are also more than a fruit.

What is your relationship with gardening?

James:

My grandfather has a green thumb. As a child, I was in awe of the garden that he maintained. Now that I am older, I am astounded at the amount of work that goes into growing all of the fruits and vegetables that are grown – raspberries, strawberries, potatoes.

I helped out a tiny bit in the garden when I was a kid; usually for an hour or two. I helped pick peas in a pod and raspberries and blackcurrants. I loved picking the fruit

Looking back, I am struck by how easy it was to tell the quality of the fruit – you knew quickly if a raspberry was ripe or not, for example. It would last a long time, too. Whereas the fruit I get in the supermarkets now expires quickly.

I was always a bit scared of bees – whenever one would come, I would try and stay as calm as possible.

I don’t have a garden or the space to plant one, although I would like to give it a go. I would like to start small and maybe grow some mint like we did in primary school for a project. I am now imagining how I would feel if I grew my own raspberries. I’m smiling. I would especially love sharing fruits I grew with people I know – receiving fresh fruit is always a joy.

I am encouraged by hearing that gardening is relaxing for Sara. This gives me more confidence that gardening could be about more than growing fruit – it is a time and space unto itself. Something that would get me outside more (I love being outdoors in spring and summer).

Part of me doubts whether I would have success in the beginning – what if I spend all that time planting a fruit only for it not to flower? I am reminded that seldom does something work out exactly as you planned the first time you try, but if you don’t try at all you’ll miss out on an experience entirely.

I have fond memories of being outside in the garden as a kid – of playing, of picking fruit, of tasting the fruits that were growing. This is not to say I enjoyed a specific plant so much as my experiences with being out in a garden are close to my heart. Nature itself means a great deal to me. I love the bustle of cities, but in my heart I am in the countryside.

Sara’s comment about tomatoes brings back the memory of my grandparents’ tomato plants. They were kept in a greenhouse-like area. I think tomato plants need heat to grow well. I remember how they would pick tomatoes when they were ready – and also lettuce – and use it in their sandwiches.

Sara:

It is a relaxing hobby? It is something that gets me outside for a short session to weed the garden or prune the trees or pick the fruit or create the protection for the young trees (the deers love it), and so on.

It is something that I have always done and I never had any bad experience with it. I remember growing the tomatoes, carrots, watermelons and zucchini in the garden when I was little, along with the roses and fruit trees. Looking back now, we were torturing the apricot trees by making them grow in a space that was a third of the meter wide. That was not enough space for basically any tree!

The strawberry garden that my grandmother had was amazing. I mean, she grew other vegetables as well, but I had priorities as a child.

I get comments from some other gardeners, since I am not the type of ‘let’s spend the entire day gardening’ and therefore I prefer to plant things without requiring too much maintenance. These days I won’t be planting tomatoes, since they require way too frequent watering. Give me something that does not require that.

So I tend to default to the herbs and fruit trees and bushes. This weekend I planted lavender, chives, parsley (I eat more than I had planted so far), strawberries, gooseberries and raspberries. They did not have basil, otherwise I would try planning that as well. One day I will get one to survive. For some reason it is notoriously difficult to keep one alive in my garden.

It is interesting to see what will overrun my garden and what is hard to kill and what is not. Rosemary will kill anything around them. Similar to lavender, except it loses to rosemary. The mint, the primrose, the daffodil and tulips will try to overtake my entire garden. The houseleek, strawberry and thyme will simply continue to grow and live. Origano would also, but one was planted a bit too close to the lavender. That lavender is the one plant that I don’t know what to do, as it grows in a direction across the asphalt and trying to trim it into something presentable will kill it.

It provides me with something and I will continue doing it as something relaxing and something I will never allow any stress to come from.

A probably unwanted advice to James… You can always start with something that you like to eat and it is hard to kill. Not requiring a lot of space is probably also a bonus, if you don’t have an actual garden. Strawberries tend to not require as much care. Or mint, as you also noted as wanting to try. Rosebary, lavender, camomile and more.

That reminds me that I forgot to plant chamomile in my garden. I hope I am not too late for it yet.

Do cherry blossoms grow where you live?

James:

Cherry blossoms do grow here!

I love cherry blossoms. On my walks as winter receded and spring started this year, I paid attention to the tips of branches. I eagerly awaited buds, the sign that soon there would be growth and blossom.

I remember looking up where I could find cherry blossoms a few years ago online. I found a few guides that mentioned specific places where trees would be in the city. I spent a day walking around Edinburgh looking out for cherry blossoms – in the Meadows, the tree at the bottom of the Royal Mile, and more.

As I write, the cherry blossoms are in full bloom. There are white and pink blossom trees. I am savouring the moment. On my walks, I find my attention regularly drifting to the blossoms – to their stage of growth, to the colour, to the way the petals look when illuminated by the sun at different times of the day. I know that the blossom is fleeting, so I need to make the most of it.

Today I learned about the Sakura Cherry Tree Project, a collaboration between the UK and Japan where cherry trees are planted to celebrate our friendship as nations. Their website notes that over 7,500 Sakura trees have been planted as part of the partnership. This is a wonderful project!

While I do not know the answer to Sara’s question, I am curious! I wish the botanic garden luck in preserving the cherry blossom they have.

Sara:

What is the difference between an apple blossom and a cherry blossom? I mean, we have cherry trees here and we have cherry blossoms here as well, buta lot of fruit trees have similarly amazing blossoms that I am also enjoying. Having a variety means that the season of having the blooms in the trees to enjoy is a lot longer.

The cherry blossoms we have at the seaside house are currently in bloom, going towards the end.

I know a local botanical garden is proud of the cherry blossom they got from Japan as part of the diplomatic relationship and are fighting right now to get it preserved and not destroyed as part of the upgrade to the train infrastructure.

When is the harvest season?

James:

I think what we could call harvest season is in August. This is when wheat and various vegetables are harvested from the fields. I suppose this is distinct from the fruit picking that usually happens mid-summer, I think. As I write, I realise how much I don’t know, but that’s okay. I should ask gardeners more questions when I have the chance and keep my ears open.

When I was in primary school, we would celebrate harvest season by making gift baskets for the elderly people in the community and deliver them by hand to people in the neighbourhood. In the years following school, I haven’t heard much about harvest festivals. I should keep my eyes out this year to see if there are any events.

Sara:

When I saw this question, the first one I would ask is for what plant? If one is talking about wheat, then I have zero idea - the majority of the wheat that my country produces is from Prekumrje and surrounding regions and not where I live - it is way too hilly where I live.

For the celebration aspect, we usually have trgatev, which is the harvest of the grapes. This is generally happening in September as it needs some time for the mošt (the wine before it becomes wine, the dictionary is giving me must, new wine, grape juice) to become wine, which is one of our biggest celebrations in November.

Don’t plan any trips at this time, as it is the time of the year with the most drunk drivers in Slovenia.

Olives also have the harvest season and that is usually a bit before the 1st of November. We don’t have enough olives to turn them into an oil ourselves, but as long as one produces at least 50 kg of olives, one can participate in the group and then get a corresponding ratio of the oil. Some percent of the oil remains with the person squeezing the oil from the olives as payment as well. (I suspect some other payment is also required, but since I don’t own a car, I am never the one to drive the olives there)

The end of summer is also corn season and when we were children we used to steal some of them to make them on the fire. We have a specific word for stealing the produce from the plants (rabutati) and generally the children are allowed to do this (in small quantities) and the adults are not.

Otherwise, when it is time to pick the fruit, like the cherries, the regions having a lot of these types of fruit would have a celebration and this is how one knows that it is that kind of season - assuming one does not have it in their gardens.

What plants did you most enjoy as a child?

James:

My favourite fruit growing up was blackcurrants. It still is, although I have not had a freshly-grown blackcurrant in a few years. Most of my blackcurrant consumption has been in the form of home-made jam from my grandmother. Her jams are the best.

As for plants, I am reminded of an experience I had earlier this week. While walking on a sunny evening, I decided to run my hand across some of the leaves on the trees next to where I was walking. The experience was grounding. I enjoyed feeling the textures of the leaves. I felt a child-like sense of joy and curiosity. What does this plant feel like? I wonder.

I remember there was a plant that would stick to your clothes. I’m not sure what it is called. My memory refers to it as a “sticky plant”. There is surely something to be said about describing something by its attributes in absence of knowing its name, especially as a kid. I liked that plant. Its sticky property made me laugh.

I liked the helicopter seeds that would fly off trees. Those were always fun! It was fun to try and find one, throw it up in the air, and watch it spin. I haven’t noticed one in a while. I need to keep my eyes peeled!

I appreciated pinecones, too. They are a curious plant. I still don’t know anything about pinecones other than their name or what they look like.

Sara’s point reflecting on what she picked up as an adult is evocative. I am thinking about how much time I spend appreciating Nature as an observer rather than touching things. Among my favourite things to do is to go out for a walk in spring. Nature forever has my heart. But I don’t touch as many things in Nature as I did as a kid.

I have a few house plants in front of me right now. I just rubbed my fingers across one of the leaves. The leaf – on a plant whose species I cannot remember right now – is firm. It’s easy for my finger to grip onto the surface. The leaf feels resilient. I can feel ridges in the leaf.

Sara’s mention of linden trees led me to do a bit of research to see if that was the tree. After some research, the helicopter seeds were likely from a sycamore tree! Although there are similarities in the structure of the seeds – both have a propeller-like top.

Sara:

Blueberries we got in the forests, gooseberries from the garden of one of my classmates and currant from our neighbors and strawberries from my grandmother. :)

We also had a lot of fun playing with one of the plants that is good to put on the small cuts, but I don’t even know the name in Slovenian. When you pulled on the leaf, you checked for the veins sticking out and this could predict your future. It was a version of counting the leaves on the daisy.

We also had a huge walnut tree next to the school, so in the autumn we spent time after school eating them. Going towards the forest, there were also hazelnut bushes that we could eat from.

We also enjoyed kislica (wikipedia says sorrel, but the image looks very wrong), as we would pick them from the grass and eat them.

We were also playing around with the linden trees, as it would make for something that soared through the sky in a playful way. (Maybe this was the helicopter that James also mentioned? Does linden even grows in Scotland)

It is actually interesting compared to what I picked up as an adult and what adults at the time were interested in. Things like elderberries, dandelions, nettles and chestnuts. Picking up beech nuts also became popular recently, though I don’t participate in these.

I actually can see the pinecone from my window! I know that people used to pick the cones to heat their homes in the past. Don’t try to heat it with the wood from it - it has so much resin, it will make the fireplace unusable eventually. This stuff is almost impossible to clean.

James:

My grandmother can always tell when it is going to rain. She can feel it.

Last year, I remember walking and feeling like it was going to start to rain. I was not paying attention to the clouds. The atmosphere felt different. It was warmer. There was something in the air. It is going to rain.

I never knew what she meant about feeling that it is going to rain, or what my mum meant when she said that you can smell rain. But I am starting to appreciate it. There is a change in the atmosphere.

I love those moments when you realise that you can appreciate something that you couldn’t fully understand as a kid. The moments that made you wonder ten years ago that, finally, you can start to understand.

While I love the sunshine immeasurably, I do grow wary after many days of warm weather that the plants will need some water – the trees and the fruits. I think about the farmers, too, who may surely be looking for water after particularly warm spells. I hope for the water so that the plants can grow.

After days of beautiful sunshine, it has been raining a bit here recently. Light rains are forecast for the next week. I think the trees will appreciate the water.

Sara:

One of our famous stories that was also made into a movie is Kekec. In one of the movies Mojca, a blind friend of Kekec, is eventually cured of blindness after getting a herbal preparation for it from the evil herbalist. (Honestly, it probably says more about how much we don’t value weirdness as a culture than anything else that the herbalist is a villain of the story)

Another one is when a hunter tried to kill ibex to get the key to the treasure. The blood from it made the pink cinquefoil sprout from the ground, and when the ibex ate it to heal itself. It then killed the hunter by throwing it in the precipice and then destroyed the garden, turning it into stone, then disappeared.

As for the note on James’ writing, sometimes I can also tell it is going to rain, but it is not from the plants but from the wind and the smell and the visibility. Also the heaviness of the air. (It is raining where I am right now)

Working on this piece grounds us in the nourishment we can find in Nature: from the memories we have of being connected to plants and fruits and trees growing up to the feeling of a plant as it rolls across our fingertips.

We are also reminded of the commonalities of Nature across the globe. Even with the thousand miles of distance between the authors, there were and are shared experiences. Is it because food is such an important part of our existence? The common influences of living on the same continent? And yet each of our experiences has varied and it shows the many ways we celebrate nature.

The stories around the fire can continue, but it is a lot more interesting when other people participate. What are some of your stories about gardening and the food you grow and harvest from when you live?

This blog post was also published on Sara’s website.

Experiments (sometimes work and sometimes don’t) - James' Coffee Blog

2025-04-14T11:36:00.000Z

When I write about what I am building with technology, I often love showing off something I made and explaining how it works. With that said, I can only get to the point of something ready to share after thinking, experimenting, and following the direction that feels right as I make something. As with writing, the direction of the software I make is paved as I work.

I wanted to take some time to reflect on a recent experiment that I haven’t quite made my mind up on. I don’t usually do this, but my blog is a place for me to explore and play. Why not try something new?

I have been thinking about what an indie web version of StumbleUpon would look like. I did not use the tool when it was popular, but the idea of an extension to the browser that lets you explore new web pages is still appealing today. I want to build tools for the open web, not silos. Tools that encourage you to explore others’ websites are exciting to me.

I decided to experiment with a feature in Artemis, the calm web reader I am developing, that takes you to a random link from your link graph. A user’s link graph lists all of the sites to which people they follow have linked. For instance, if you followed me and I linked to indieweb.org, that link would be part of your link graph.

I call this feature “wander”, inspired by the Wander page on my website that links to other websites I love.

When you go to https://artemis.jamesg.blog/wander as a signed in user, you will be redirected to a random page that a site you followed linked to. I have this as a bookmark in my browser, meaning any time I am in the mood to explore the web I am only one click away from something new.

This experiment interests me because it lets me explore the surface of the community I am in. Links are more likely to be related to my interests, I thought, because there is a higher chance that a link on someone’s blog is interesting to me than a random link. To add a link to a page is a choice that has meaning.

Clicking on the wander page a few times, I am taken to links from the MySQL documentation to a blog I follow with the most delightful design to a sitemap.

As with any random mechanism, the choice of page is… random. Sometimes the links are interesting, other times they are not.

With that said, I have found more interest in exploring links on sites like Blogroll.org than being taken to a random link. This makes me appreciate how much I love the context around links – the words and descriptions that give me insight into what is at a linked resource before I make the decision to click it. I love looking through lists of blogs and choosing the ones that look interesting to read into more.

This leads me to an interesting-to-me conclusion: I really, really appreciate manually curated resources. They preserve context. They are a reflection of taste and choice and interest.

The Artemis random link choice feature doesn’t match the serendipity of a link directory. I have sometimes seen links I go to, or feel like I don’t have enough context to really appreciate the link. I’m not wandering so much as being dropped into a new place and trying to find my bearings.

Experiments sometimes work and sometimes don’t. I am trying to encourage myself to be more experimental. To play more. The link graph feature is one such example of this. Sometimes you really need to see something and play around with it to figure out whether it’s interesting or not – to find places that can be improved or changed. And often, experiments lead you to realisations that you wouldn’t have otherwise had.

What we see in our websites (and why I am so excited about the... - James' Coffee Blog

2025-04-13T21:54:00.000Z

Stories of one’s personal website – from why one started a website to the decisions made and lessons learned while making and using the site – are plentiful. Rightfully so, I think. I love reading others’ perspectives on websites. I love writing about my website. It is delightful that we use our websites to say what we see in this medium we call the web.

A pattern I have noticed is how many different metaphors we use to describe our websites. Websites. Digital gardens. Homes on the web. “Places to…” More broadly, people start websites for all sorts of reasons – to write, to learn coding, because they saw someone else talk about websites and got excited, because it looks fun. I don’t have a cohesive list. I would love for such a list to exist. ¹

We all see different things in our websites. What we see changes over time, too. I saw my site as a place to write about coffee and technology. I thought about it as a place to experiment with writing. A place to play. Then a place to experiment with HTML and CSS, the building blocks of the web. My thoughts about how I describe my website, and my relationship to this site, change over time. One thing, however, stays constant: I love making things on my website.

I am excited about the web and personal websites because there are so many ways they can be used. And that you don’t need to have a grand philosophy to get started. I certainly didn’t think about my site as a place to play, although I have always had fun making it. The very notion that personal websites can fun pursuit shows potential for more people to come along and try starting a website.

Making a website will not be fun for everyone, and that’s more than okay! I don’t want to become a painter but it doesn’t mean I am not moved by works of art.

Susam recently wrote a blog post titled “The IndieWeb Doesn’t Need to “Take Off“, noting:

Maintaining a personal website is about owning your digital presence, embracing creative freedom, and expressing your individuality! It’s not about appealing to the masses!

The IndieWeb doesn’t need to go mainstream to be meaningful. It’s a celebration of a more personal, decentralised, and creative world wide web.

With every personal website made, every web page published, every story told, every experiment embarked on, we can expand the aperture of the web. We can introduce people to its potential. We can expand the potential of the web, too. I sometimes hear people talk about the “old web”, a term that I increasingly think is not apt. While speaking to a creative time on the web, I am more excited about the question: given all that we have done with the web, what can we do now? What excites you?

I am excited and encouraged by how many personal websites there are out there, made with love, by people around the world. Yesterday, I passed so much time by clicking links on Blogroll.org, excited by all the websites, and the diversity of people and topics represented therein.

My excitement is cautiously placed. There are undoubtably challenge presents both today and ahead, among them: how do we keep the principles behind the web alive in all generations? Here, “generations” may refer to a period even as much as five years. The web is so new and changing so fast. Trends change.

There is no one answer to the question of keeping the principles behind the web alive, and, more broadly, encouraging more people to start websites. It’s a hard question. But, amid all of this, I cannot help but be encouraged by how many people I have seen start websites.

If everyone has a different story behind starting a website, I am implored to think of how many potentialities there are in the web: how many different things we all see in the web, how this is and should be a medium for everyone to bring their ideas and make something, how this is and can be a place to express creativity in a way that that interests you ².

This sentiment – one of possibility that I see acknowledged across so many website stories, and in conversations with people who run websites – makes me more excited than ever. My website has brought me years of joy. Isn’t it exciting that this could be true for so many other people out there?

How do we keep the spirit of the indie web alive? We keep talking about it. We keep sharing the joys. We question assumptions. We ask the tough questions. We make the things that excite us. We remind others that the web was designed as an open platform not to be controlled by any one person. We evaluate what the web means now, given what we have learned from its history. We remind ourselves that the web is for everyone. And we cannot forget that there surely are people starting websites out there every day, and so many people yet to discover the open web.

Maybe I should start a website that collects one-paragraph summaries of why you started your website.

[↩]

I see this as a call for more open web tools that empower people to make things in new ways on the web.

[↩]

What if YouTube had slug-based URLs? - James' Coffee Blog

2025-04-13T20:42:00.000Z

Here is an example of a link that, when clicked, sends you to a YouTube video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RsEZmictANA

The URL structure could be so much better. Without clicking on the link, the only context you have is that the site being linked to is YouTube.com. Many messaging services support the Open Graph Protocol ¹, but relying solely on Open Graph data is not ideal. What if there is an error in retrieving the Open Graph data?

The URL could convey more context about the linked resource but it is not. *Why not add a little more context? *The URL needs to be shared for someone to access a resource anyway.

The link above takes you to Taylor Swift’s willow music video. If you haven’t heard the song, please feel free to stop reading and go listen. It’s a poetic, relaxing tune!

Now, back to the post.

What if, instead, YouTube used a structure like:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/slug

Like:

https://www.youtube.com/taylor-swift/willow

This structure allows for so much more context to be conveyed. Ideally, users could set slugs themselves. Slug design is part of URL design. URLs are UX.

One foreseeable problem with this approach is that the slug doesn’t say anything of whether the resource is actually by the specified author. YouTube has reputation signals on-page – the “Official Artist Channel” for musicians, for example, view counts, subscriber counts.

I generally prefer readable URLs that follow a clear pattern. But would the more descriptive URL have the potential to be misleading? A URL with an ID says nothing to a human, but maybe that is useful in this case? Two separate accounts could have taylorswift and taylor-swift. Indeed, this is a problem with any username-based scheme, and reputation signals are not available in a URL unless the above UR structure was only available to verified authors.

I’m not sure if my idea Is better or worse than the status quo, but I do find this a fascinating topic to think about.

https://ogp.me/

[↩]

The joy of - James' Coffee Blog

2025-04-13T20:17:00.000Z

The joy of:

Walking and cherry blossom petals falling around you.
Noticing how charming a building you have walked past dozens of times is. I noticed a clock at the top of a building that I have never seen before.
Seeing someone with their hands up their sleeves on a spring day. Like me!
Noticing the first red tulips emerge this season.
Seeing people rest under trees in the park on a warm spring morning.
Hearing talented musicians play acoustic songs in a public square.
Seeing people smile.
Seeing flowers in pots growing at doorsteps.
The warmth of the sun on your cheek on a sunny day.
Looking out over hills.
Sharing stories.
Conversations where you notice someone’s eyes light up.
Hearing someone talk about something they enjoy.
Warm hugs.

Ordering posts by published date and time - James' Coffee Blog

2025-04-13T20:12:00.000Z

My static site generator orders posts by file name. Post file names follow this structure:

yyyy-mm-dd-slug.md

For example, the title of this page is 2025-04-13-ordering-posts.md.

While this works to ensure posts are ordered depending on their publication day, there is one significant limitation with this approach: if I publish multiple posts in a day, there is no guaranteed order.

A few months ago, I added a feature that automatically adds the hours, minutes, and seconds at which a post was published on my website to the front matter of a post. But, I forgot to use this information in the sorting! Now, posts are sorted by the date and time at which the post was published, rather than the slug. ¹

What got me thinking about this was Bon Iver’s new album, SABLE fABLE. The first two songs in Disc 2 blend into each other such that for a moment you don’t realise that the new song has begun. It made me think about the importance of ordering posts properly on my site. I sometimes write two or more blog posts in the same time frame that may be best read in chronological order because, as I wrote them, my thoughts developed.

Ensuring posts are ordered by publication date is a step in the right direction, but it doesn’t get at the idea that an earlier post in a day may be best read before another. I don’t necessarily want to curate post order each day, but I suppose that in choosing to do full reverse chronological ordering I do miss something. Maybe I should add notes to the top of posts that flow in a series to hint that I started the train of thought that led me to this next post in a previous work?

With that said, reverse chronological ordering is much better than the previous status quo: a pseudo-random order where slugs impacted post order. I am glad to finally have my posts ordered by publication date and time!

My web feeds now broadcast publication dates, too, so your web reader should be able to display posts in the order they were published!

[↩]

Morning CSS - James' Coffee Blog

2025-04-13T19:37:00.000Z

Before leaving the house this morning, I decided to work on my website. I have 15 minutes before I leave, maybe I can fit in some web weaving.

I worked on the mobile navigation bar. For a while, I have thought that the reading experience could be improved. There were lots of links; all the links were text. Last night, I reduced the number of links and this morning I added icons.

I was writing CSS down to the wire. If I didn’t finish on time, I would miss my train. I had done some experimentation in the evening so I was as ready as I could be. But I didn’t have time to set the spacing between elements.

By the time you are reading this, the mobile navigation bar will have a new, more focused design, with icons to differentiate links!

Why are there no movies where a character has to write CSS in a hurry? To whom do I write to propose such a plot feature?

When a side project finds you - Manuel Moreale RSS Feed

2025-04-12T08:45:00.000Z

I didn’t plan to start working on a new side project and yet, here we are. Back in the summer of 2023 when I had the idea for People and Blogs and I purchased the peopleandblogs.com domain name I said to myself “This is the last domain I’m gonna buy for a side project”.

Fast forward roughly a year and a half and I get an email from the always lovely Ray asking me if I was interested in becoming the new owner and custodian of his blogroll.org. I couldn’t pass on the opportunity. As you know, I am very into blogging and personal sites because I truly believe those are the antidote to the current awful state of the web. I started the P&B series because I wanted to help people connect with one another, facilitate discovery, and encourage more people to get back into blogging. That is because I believe that if you have something worth sharing, it’s better to do it on a site you control, rather than on social media. And blogroll.org, as a project, is very much aligned with that goal which is why I immediately said yes to Ray.

It took me a while to code a new version of the site and move everything from WordPress to Kirby but the new version is finally online.

I have to say that I’m quite pleased with this new version. It’s a lot more colourful than the sites I usually make but that tracks with the way my life is changing. I’m starting to get a bit tired of all this black and white and colours feel a lot more playful. The site is set in Sofia Pro and as mentioned runs on the latest Kirby version. It’s a V1, many features are missing and there are a lot of entries in my to-do list for this project but I’m happy that it’s at least online and people can start submitting sites again.

Like all the other things I’m doing online these days, the site is supported by the kindness of friends and strangers and if you find projects like this to be valuable and want to contribute you can join them for as little as 1$ a month.

As always if you have comments, feedback or feature requests, you can email me. My inbox is always open.

Thank you for keeping RSS alive. You're awesome.

Email me :: Sign my guestbook :: Support for 1$/month :: See my generous supporters :: Subscribe to People and Blogs

BSSG (Bash Static Site Generator) - Baty.net

2025-04-11T14:05:36.000Z

Today I learned about BSSG, a static site generator written using Bash.

I’ve been chugging along with Hugo for a minute, but you just know I have to try every new thing I discover, so…

bssg.baty.net

How fun is that!?

Written by Stefano Marinelli, BSSG is so simple and easy to use that I had a blog started in, I swear, two minutes. The only thing I had to do was change MARKDOWN_PROCESSOR to use pandoc, and I was off and running. Nice.

But there a lot of SSGs out there. Why BSSG? It’s the themes! Every blogging platform for the past 10 years has featured themes that feel like a personal branding exercise. Like something you’d want to feature on your LinkedIn profile. Gross.

BSSD has like 50 themes ready to go. Many of them are so weird and retro that I fell in love. I mean, look at the “BBS” theme…

My test blog using the bbs theme

I don’t need a new blog, and I promised myself I’d keep baty.net on Hugo, but damn, I feel like finding a use for this, just for the fun of it.

~hedy's blogroll - BlogFlock

P&B: Frills - Manuel Moreale RSS Feed

Let's start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

What's the story behind your blog?

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what's your position on people monetising personal blogs?

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

Awesome supporters

Want to support P&B?

Friday, April 25, 2025 - Baty.net

Fixing the mind - Manuel Moreale RSS Feed

Wednesday, April 23, 2025 - Baty.net

Consolidating my email handling in Emacs - Baty.net

More breaking changes in Hugo - Baty.net

Friday, April 18, 2025 - Baty.net

P&B: Jeremy Keith - Manuel Moreale RSS Feed

Let's start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?

What's the story behind your blog?

What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?

Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?

A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?

Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?

Financial question since the Web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost, or does it generate some revenue? And what's your position on people monetising personal blogs?

Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?

Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?

Awesome supporters

Want to support P&B?

Thursday, April 17, 2025 - Baty.net

FiiO CP13 Portable Cassette Player - Baty.net

Earliest memory of coffee - James' Coffee Blog

What is your earliest memory of coffee?

Your turn

Gardening, fruit and Nature with Sara and James - James' Coffee Blog

What fruits are commonly grown where you live?

What is your relationship with gardening?

Do cherry blossoms grow where you live?

When is the harvest season?

What plants did you most enjoy as a child?

Do you have any interesting stories related to plants?

Experiments (sometimes work and sometimes don’t) - James' Coffee Blog

What we see in our websites (and why I am so excited about the... - James' Coffee Blog

What if YouTube had slug-based URLs? - James' Coffee Blog

The joy of - James' Coffee Blog

Ordering posts by published date and time - James' Coffee Blog

Morning CSS - James' Coffee Blog

When a side project finds you - Manuel Moreale RSS Feed

BSSG (Bash Static Site Generator) - Baty.net