The web, the internet and all that

The web is a fascinating place and what an age to live in. This collection is a mess of things I have loosely tagged as web and cover a lot of different web based topics such as websites, email and even operating systems, which technically are not the web as such, it has afforded me a living for many years, has kept me passionate about communicating with the outside world, has found me friends - and hey it's my site, this is what the web is all about.

Posts about The web, the internet and all that

• Creating Cloudflare redirects

  on Wed, Oct 8, 2025 ~ Shorticles | Web | Eleventy
  Notes on optimal ways to pull together a redirects file suitable for a Cloudflare hosted website.

• Apple OSX Messages full stops emoticon bug

  on Sun, Jun 15, 2025 ~ Shorticles | Web
  When macOS Messages throws a wobbly—what broke, how to spot it, and the quick fixes that calm the chaos, with a wink for sufferers of Apple’s little quirks.

• Recovery from a Bing de-indexing

  on Mon, Apr 7, 2025 ~ Post | Web | SEO
  My personal site vanished from Bings index and it took quite a while to get it back in - here is what I found and did.

• Creating a blogroll page from Mastodon bookmarks

  on Fri, Apr 4, 2025 ~ Post | Web | Eleventy
  How I built a page with a list of the toots I have bookmarked in Mastodon.

• Marketing URLs - when and how to use them

  on Fri, Feb 7, 2025 ~ Post | SEO | Web
  Discover why URL shorteners like Bitly may not be ideal for SEO and how to implement your own memorable, branded redirects for better marketing results.

• The 2025 blog question challenge answers

  on Mon, Jan 20, 2025 ~ Post | Web
  I reflect on my blogging journey, platforms like 11ty, my writing process, favorite posts, and Ava’s Bear Blog Challenge.

• Newspaper style layout for my content

  on Sat, Sep 14, 2024 ~ Shorticles | Web
  Simon Cox experiments with a newspaper-style layout using CSS columns, grayscale filters, and a custom design to replicate the feel of vintage newsprint.

• The cobbles of Mousehole

  on Sat, Jul 13, 2024 ~ Shorticles | Web
  Simon Cox shares a scenic view of the charming mythical cobbles of Mousehole, capturing the essence of this picturesque Cornish village in a brief snapshot.

• Tracking 404 broken links with Fathom Analytics

  on Sun, Feb 11, 2024 ~ Shorticles | Web
  How I set up Fathom Analytics to track 404 broken URLs so that I could redirect those links to the correct page.

• Build your own 11ty starter

  on Sat, Aug 5, 2023 ~ Post | Web
  If you want to build a website quickly then 11ty is a great tool. Here is how I set up my starter pack to get me up and running in a few minutes.

• How I set up lastmod date in my 11ty xml sitemap

  on Thu, Jul 6, 2023 ~ Post | Web
  Google now want an accurate lastmod date in the xml sitemap. Here is how I set it up in my 11ty site.

• Netlify prerender cache

  on Sun, Jun 4, 2023 ~ Shorticles | Web
  Crawling a newly changed website on Netlify can bring you incorrect cached results!

• Cloudflare Pages error with 11ty build

  on Mon, May 15, 2023 ~ Shorticles | Web
  Troubleshoot Cloudflare Pages errors with 11ty. Set Node version in Environment Variables to resolve build failures and deploy successfully now today.

• Interaction to Next Paint, the new Core Web Vital

  on Wed, May 10, 2023 ~ Shorticles | Web
  INP, Interaction to Next Paint is no longer experimental and is due to be included as part of the Core Web Vitals by March 2024.

• Alternative to Google Analytics

  on Wed, May 10, 2023 ~ Shorticles | Web
  Is there a viable alternative to Google Analytics - yes it's Fathom Analytics.

• html neck tag

  on Tue, May 9, 2023 ~ Shorticles | Web
  Poking fun at the mythical HTML tag—where semantics meet silliness, standards collide with satire, and web nerds nod knowingly at a cheeky non-element.

• AI making some astonishing leaps

  on Thu, Mar 23, 2023 ~ Shorticles | Web
  AI technologies have been making huge leaps over the last week.

• Webmentions

  on Sun, Feb 5, 2023 ~ Shorticles | Web
  I have added webmentions to this 11ty build.

• Netlify CMS

  on Sat, Feb 4, 2023 ~ Shorticles | Web
  Somehow I have managed to add the Netlify CMS to the site.

• 11ty inline minified css

  on Fri, Feb 3, 2023 ~ Shorticles | Web
  Minifying css for 11ty sites.

• Website re-platform and a light redesign for 2023

  on Fri, Feb 3, 2023 ~ Post | Web
  Website rebuild using Eleventy for a faster, flat-file setup. Improved SEO, performance, and design while optimizing hosting with Netlify and Cloudflare Pages.

• How to get your Wix website verified on Mastodon

  on Tue, Nov 8, 2022 ~ Post | Web
  Simon Cox explains how to verify a Wix website on Mastodon by embedding a proper link rel=me tag in the site's header for successful identity confirmation.

• How to find insecure pages in your site before Google start penalising

  on Sat, Feb 10, 2018 ~ Post | Web
  From July 2018, Google flagged non-secure sites. Learn how to use Screaming Frog’s Insecure Content Report to fix your site.

• How I add canonicals into Perch CMS sites

  on Wed, Nov 29, 2017 ~ Post | Web
  Canonical links tell search engines where the original page is. Google favors the oldest version and flags others as duplicates.

• Fix Apple Mail ’Unable to Verify Account Name or Password’ Error

  on Thu, Oct 5, 2017 ~ Post | Web | Featured
  Struggling with Apple Mail login issues? I found a fix for keychain-related errors affecting LinkedIn, Google, Flickr, and more.

• Using a CDN to help migrate your sites hosting

  on Sun, Sep 18, 2016 ~ Post | Web
  Moving a site to new hosting can be fraught with issues. Here is one technique that I find useful when moving to a website to a new hosting server.

• EU cookie consent law largely ignored

  on Mon, May 28, 2012 ~ Post | Web
  The UK had until May 28, 2012, to comply with the EU cookie law. How many organizations met the ICO's deadline?

• Uploading images outside of Perch CMS default resource directory

  on Fri, May 11, 2012 ~ Shorticles | Web
  Moving images outside of Perch default folder - how I did it…

• ExpressionEngine custom log-in page

  on Wed, Oct 12, 2011 ~ Shorticles | Web
  How I customised the ExpressionEngine log-in page for a more on-brand experience.

• EEUK11 report from the 2011 ExpressionEngine conference in Manchester

  on Sat, Aug 27, 2011 ~ Post | Web | Trips
  The UK's first ExpressionEngine conference took place in Manchester in 2011—I share a report on the event and surrounding activities.

• Assets for ExpressionEngine

  on Sun, Jul 3, 2011 ~ Post | Web
  Assets for ExpressionEngine improves file management. I installed it and built a simple image gallery to test its capabilities.

• Responsive web design

  on Tue, May 31, 2011 ~ Post | Web
  Inspired by Simon Collison, I implemented Responsive Web Design on my site as the approach gained momentum over two years.

• Preventing deep linking

  on Tue, Nov 9, 2010 ~ Shorticles | Web
  Why would anyone want to prevent incoming links? Lots of sites terms and conditions don't allow it!

• WebFonts

  on Wed, Jul 28, 2010 ~ Post | Web
  With HTML5 evolving, I explore modern web fonts, current techniques, and the latest in digital typography.

• Nibbler

  on Tue, Feb 9, 2010 ~ Post | Web
  Online testing suites are a very useful way of checking your website to see if it's up to scratch. I take you through Nibbler from Silktide.

• New look for 2010

  on Tue, Jan 26, 2010 ~ Post | Web
  A fresh new look for the site having moved it to ExpressionEngine.

• Content stealing

  on Wed, Jun 14, 2006 ~ Shorticles | Web
  TIs someone stealing your content? You probably don't know. I just read a piece over on Learning Movable Type that sparked this post off.

• Dashes vs Underscores

  on Thu, Jun 1, 2006 ~ Shorticles | Web
  An ongoing debate about whether it is better to use a dash, or hyphen, in a file name or to use an underscore instead. I used the underscore for many years.

• Javascript SymWinOpen function pain

  on Fri, Dec 23, 2005 ~ Shorticles | Web
  This one really bugged me. I was trying to validate some code I had uploaded to a staging area on a site and it would not validate back on my PC running CSE HTML Validate.

• Peter Cochrane's Uncommon Sense - Web Realities

  on Thu, May 8, 2003 ~ Shorticles | Web
  This is a description of my new short.

• Microsoft plans toilets with Web access

  on Wed, May 7, 2003 ~ Shorticles | Web
  This is a description of my new short.

• wma189

  on Tue, May 6, 2003 ~ Shorticles | SEO | Web
  I was getting a lot of traffic due to some spammers

• Boogle

  on Wed, Apr 23, 2003 ~ Shorticles | Web
  Very disappointed today to open Google UK to find no St George's Day banner.

• Web site undergoing more changes

  on Sun, Apr 20, 2003 ~ Shorticles | Web
  I am moving the cms over to Moveable Type.

• Movable Type moves to Simoncox.com!

  on Wed, Apr 16, 2003 ~ Shorticles | Web
  I have installed MoveableType personal Publishing System onto the site

• New look new server

  on Tue, Jul 9, 2002 ~ Shorticles | Web
  I have got my act together at last and started shifting content to a dedicated web space.

• Upgrade to The Gallery

  on Fri, May 17, 2002 ~ Shorticles | Web
  I upgraded my photo gallery with new slideshow features to match the site's design, but sadly had to remove it in 2010. My images are now available on Flickr

• Accessibility links with css

  on Tue, May 14, 2002 ~ Shorticles | Web
  Lots of sites use short catchy 'action' terms to entice people into further sections of thier sites. Here is an alternative method. Accessibility links with css

• Mac Classic OS windows with css!

  on Mon, May 13, 2002 ~ Shorticles | Web
  A couple of Mac sites have complicated tables forming Mac like windows for showing stories. I tried this in css alone and reduce the number of graphics as well.

• It's a start with CSS

  on Sat, May 11, 2002 ~ Shorticles | Web
  Over the past few years I have become more and more engrossed with Cascading Style Sheets and the benefits they offer to the web.

• CSS rollovers - no javascript!

  on Sat, May 11, 2002 ~ Shorticles | Web
  I wanted stylish CSS rollover buttons—not just color blocks—so I explored techniques beyond basic JavaScript effects.

• New look site!

  on Fri, May 3, 2002 ~ Shorticles | Web
  The up side of being unwell is that I have spent this week delving into CSS.

• Microsoft - Hotmail pain...

  on Fri, May 3, 2002 ~ Shorticles | Web
  Just checked my hotmail account - which I only have so that I can use MSN Messenger because certain friends use it rather than ICQ.

• The latest webcam images

  on Sun, Jul 9, 2000 ~ Shorticles | Web
  OK Big changes to this page in July 2007! We now have a timelapse webcam picture for you.