General

2025-05-11T00:00:00.000Z 11th May 2025

From the Sage Smart Grinder Pro to the Niche Zero: A comparison and walkthrough Draft

A coffee blog about upgrading grinders, the differences and how I would rate them

2025-05-11T00:00:00.000Z 11th May 2025

Timeline arc: Coffee

A post about this history of one of my hobbies: Coffee., a navel-gazing meander of coffee machines & grinders

2024-12-31T00:00:00.000Z 31st December 2024

2024 In Review

2024 saw planes, trains and trips

2024-12-23T00:00:00.000Z 23rd December 2024

2024 Quiz of the Year

A Christmas quiz for (nearly) all ages

2024-12-05T00:00:00.000Z 5th December 2024

Slow upload speed with Apple MacOS - how to debug and what to check

Recently the upload speed on my MacOS devices suddenly dropped - debugging was a nightmare

2024-11-14T00:00:00.000Z 14th November 2024

thisisunsafe - how to bypass Chrome's ERR_CERT_INVALID warning Draft

During development or pre-launch, you may be faced with a ERR_CERT_INVALID - how do you bypass it?

2024-11-14T00:00:00.000Z 14th November 2024

thisisunsafe - how to bypass Chrome's ERR_CERT_INVALID warning

During development or pre-launch, you may be faced with a ERR_CERT_INVALID - how do you bypass it?

2024-02-09T00:00:00.000Z 9th February 2024

Tweetback

I set up a self-hosted read-only archive of my tweets

2023-12-31T00:00:00.000Z 31st December 2023

2023 In Review

2023 had more miles and physical activities (including puzzles), but I struggled to get into side-projects & Geocaching

2023-07-16T00:00:00.000Z 16th July 2023

Open Door Meetings - How I can bother my colleagues without interrupting them

Appointments help us arrange meetings with other staff members without forcing them to context switch.

2023-05-06T00:00:00.000Z 6th May 2023

The End of the Social Network School Year

Twitter has gone down the drain and, with it, the sense of community I used to have

2023-02-19T00:00:00.000Z 19th February 2023

Writing more evergreen blog post topics is hard

Writing evergreen content is the golden egg, but it's not as easy as one might think

2023-01-17T00:00:00.000Z 17th January 2023

Why I miss the limitations of CD players

Spotify is vast, but I miss the stack of CDs adorning my walls

2022-12-31T00:00:00.000Z 31st December 2022

2022 In Review

2022 saw bikes and side-projects increase, while blog posts & instagram declined

2022-08-16T00:00:00.000Z 16th August 2022

Love Film & Cinema

Gone are the times where you would get a film in the post - how do we remove choice paralysis and actually watch a film?

2022-05-20T00:00:00.000Z 20th May 2022

New Apple computer set up

What steps do I go through when setting up a new computer?

2021-12-31T00:00:00.000Z 31st December 2021

2021 In Review

2021 was the year everything just carried on being a bit rubbish in the world. There were, however, some excellent highlights in the year

2021-06-28T00:00:00.000Z 28th June 2021

Incremental updates don't win awards

Liquid Light

The web industry thrives on “the big reveal” of new designs and websites but we don't believe that should ever be the case.

2021-04-06T00:00:00.000Z 6th April 2021

My 2021 writing schedule

Since 2021, I have stuck to a writing schedule - not only has it helped write more posts, it prevents the flurry of inactivity

2021-04-02T00:00:00.000Z 2nd April 2021

Side Project Imposter Syndrome

What is a side project, if not a safe place to get imposter syndrome?

2021-02-22T00:00:00.000Z 22nd February 2021

Socket RSS - The Gleefreshing answer to your Doomscrolling habits

I have recently made a side project called "Socket RSS". The idea is it becomes a place for Gleefreshing, not Doomscrolling.

2021-01-14T00:00:00.000Z 14th January 2021

Making sure you're not doing everything at work

Delegation is hard for people who find themselves in management roles. The trick is to be the overflow, not the gatekeeper.

2020-12-31T00:00:00.000Z 31st December 2020

2020 In Review

2020 brought the first pandemic of my lifetime, but plenty of good things too

2020-11-20T00:00:00.000Z 20th November 2020

What is a server?

Liquid Light

Servers power the internet and have done since the creation of it. All the websites in the world run on servers (with varying levels of web interfaces & logins). So what are they, how do they work and what do Liquid Light typically use?

2020-04-15T00:00:00.000Z 15th April 2020

Mikestreety's New Clothes

For regular readers, you will notice a fresh new face on the old dog (my first blog post that made the many migrations was from 2009!).

2019-12-31T00:00:00.000Z 31st December 2019

2019 In Review

2019 was a strange year, new kitchen, bathroom car and bike. But overall it was good. I enjoyed it.

2019-12-10T00:00:00.000Z 10th December 2019

How do you deal with designers who design without any thought?

Liquid Light

As a developer, dealing with designers and their creations can sometimes be challenging. At Liquid Light we've honed our process to ensure minimum friction between both developers and designers.

2019-11-11T00:00:00.000Z 11th November 2019

How to become device agnostic and what it means for your data

Liquid Light

All too often you hear about people losing their phones and, along with it, their data. This blog post explores how you can become "device agnostic", freeing the tether between your device and your memories.

2019-08-22T00:00:00.000Z 22nd August 2019

email.subscribeto - a newsletter database

I've always been keen to discover new newsletters and have always kept my eye out for recommendations. I decided to collate these recommendations and build a directory.

2019-07-31T00:00:00.000Z 31st July 2019

The Real World of Web Development

I read "The Real Dark Web", a blog post from @whalecoiner and within a few paragraphs it really hit home. There are a few noisy web developers who are innovating, ...

2018-12-31T00:00:00.000Z 31st December 2018

2018 in review

2018 was a big year for me, in all sorts of ways. This blog post summarises one of the most life-changing years of my life.

2018-11-17T00:00:00.000Z 17th November 2018

Xbox One vs PlayStation 4

I recently sold my Xbox One S and bout a PlayStation 4 Pro. Why did I do this and what are the differences? This post outlines my thoughts from an "everyday consumer".

2018-10-18T00:00:00.000Z 18th October 2018

Music obsessions

The table below details what I've been listening to, what I am listening to, or albums I've discovered. There is no shame in this list

2018-04-16T00:00:00.000Z 16th April 2018

Mike builds a bike

Progress of a bike build

2018-03-19T00:00:00.000Z 19th March 2018

Why we're not dropping Slack for Google Hangouts Chat...yet.

Liquid Light

At the beginning of this month, Google announced they were rolling out Hangouts Chat to all users of Google Suite over a week or so. Our suite was finally updated ...

2018-03-08T00:00:00.000Z 8th March 2018

How I wrote a book; the writing process from one of our Developers

Liquid Light

In 2017, one of our front-end developers wrote and released a book about the JavaScript library; Vue.js. This blog post explains the process he went through to get the book from his mind to print.

2017-12-31T00:00:00.000Z 31st December 2017

2017 in review

It seems to be the done thing to do a "year in review" post. I initially scoffed at the idea, but the more I thought about it, the more I thought about how keeping track of accomplishments can be a little encouragement and ego boost. So here goes!

2017-06-22T00:00:00.000Z 22nd June 2017

How I kicked a millennial habit

Changing habits is hard - especially when it's being part of your lifestyle for so long. After watching a video, I decided to address my reliance on social media and mobile phones.

2017-05-18T00:00:00.000Z 18th May 2017

Render Conf 30th March 2017 - A review

Liquid Light

On 30th March, I took the many trains over the many hours required to get to Oxford from Brighton and attended Render Conf. In it’s second year, this conference ...

2016-12-12T00:00:00.000Z 12th December 2016

"HD" cheap action cam - you get what you pay for

Recently, a friend and I purchased a cheap action camera from eBay to see what quality you get for £14

2016-08-02T00:00:00.000Z 2nd August 2016

How we use Trello to keep track of our marketing schedule

Liquid Light

Trello is a great tool which lets you easily manage projects. Ranging from websites to weddings, Trello helps you create tag and move cards. At Liquid Light, we use Trello to keep track of our marketing output - this blog explains how.

2016-07-13T00:00:00.000Z 13th July 2016

Using lego to build a device lab

Liquid Light

Making sure the websites we build work across a myriad of devices is paramount during the build process at...

2016-01-29T00:00:00.000Z 29th January 2016

My Dream: Multi-room audio with Chromecast and central music server

I have been searching for a solution to my problem for a while now and I have had no luck - so i'm putting it out to the masses to ...

2016-01-25T00:00:00.000Z 25th January 2016

YouTube videos vs self-hosted: Which one is better for you?

Liquid Light

We are often asked whether videos for your website should be uploaded and hosted on your own website and server or if they should be uploaded to a social website ...

2015-12-03T00:00:00.000Z 3rd December 2015

Let's drop IE8

Liquid Light

For website creators, making sure a website looks good across device and browsers is our biggest challenge. Websites don’t have to look the same, but they do have to ...

2015-04-30T00:00:00.000Z 30th April 2015

Using Slack to Improve Team Communication

Liquid Light

Slack is a hugely popular communication team tool which has grown from strength to strength over the last year. It was publicly released in February 2014 and has recently been valued ...

2014-12-15T00:00:00.000Z 15th December 2014

HTML Newsletters - Design Considerations

Liquid Light

HTML emails are a great way of keeping your customers up-to-date, but are not as versatile as web pages. Here's our list of things to consider when designing and building HTML emails.

2014-02-18T00:00:00.000Z 18th February 2014

Be a Better Road User

I've been cycling since I can remember, and driving since 2009. Over the last few years, I've believed something more and more and I would like to make a bold statement - Cyclists make better drivers, drivers make better cyclists

2013-07-29T00:00:00.000Z 29th July 2013

Trailwalker 2013

The Trailwalker event is something I've had my eye on for a while. 100km over 30 hours seemed like a sporting challenge I could do. I was 16 when a friend started ...

2013-05-22T00:00:00.000Z 22nd May 2013

Forget-me-not

Frank Turner, a wonderfully talented musician with whom I have recently embarked a music-man crush upon, has sung some beautiful songs on his recent album.

2013-02-21T00:00:00.000Z 21st February 2013

A world without the web

For those of you that know me, you would be aware that I have recently moved house. For those of you that don't, I have recently moved house.

2013-02-15T00:00:00.000Z 15th February 2013

Starting Afresh, Starting Anew

So like my good friends Anthony and Kris, I've realised how little i've blogged over the last year. Looking at my archive the last 6 months of 2012 played host to just 1 ...

2012-08-29T00:00:00.000Z 29th August 2012

Start Your Own Event

.net magazine

This article first appeared in issue 230 of .net magazine – the world's best-selling magazine for web designers and developers. Conferences are great. You get to meet fantastic people, you learn ...

2012-07-19T00:00:00.000Z 19th July 2012

I hate road cycling

Road cycling. Its boring. Its rubbish. Most road cyclists just go round in circles. Up to the top of a hill, turn round and back again - wash, rinse, repeat.

2012-07-11T00:00:00.000Z 11th July 2012

Future of Web Design - May 2012 - Day 1

In the middle of May, I attended my first big web conference – the Future of Web Design. I’ve been to a few small-scale conferences before, but never one but never one of the big boys

2012-05-16T00:00:00.000Z 16th May 2012

I bloody love twitter

I bloody love twitter. It's great. Now, I'm not some twitter addict or nerd, well I am, but that's by the by.

2012-02-26T00:00:00.000Z 26th February 2012

Dahon Vitesse Speed D7

Whenever I am thinking about making a significant purchase, I always hunt around for reviews, check out blogs and generally search the web for word, be it good or bad.

2012-02-16T00:00:00.000Z 16th February 2012

My Favourite 5 Books - A smashing story

Recently I've been going through a fad of buying web related books. I love the feel of books, I love reading books.

2012-02-04T00:00:00.000Z 4th February 2012

The Commute: The Rant

I’ve been commuting for nearly a year now. Proper commuting that is. Getting up at some unearthly hour to sit on a train for a bit. Living in a ...

2011-05-19T00:00:00.000Z 19th May 2011

Chilly's Dip

I found this in an old recipe book I found in a charity shop. Not quite sure what happened to it, but I've tweaked the recipe and named it after my wife!

2011-03-16T00:00:00.000Z 16th March 2011

Public Relations

Sometimes I wish we lived in a musical. Not not necessarily with all the singing but just with all that general happiness.

2010-06-25T00:00:00.000Z 25th June 2010

Wiitar: Combining the Wiimote, MAX/MSP and Mainstage

For the final year of my degree, I was required to create an Experimental System Design. At the time, I was heavily involved with a live version of The ...

2010-06-02T00:00:00.000Z 2nd June 2010

The next step...

So you've got a brand new website that you want to promote? Recently I finished a website for Frag Records. Once completed they asked me for some hints and tips ...

2010-04-22T00:00:00.000Z 22nd April 2010

Twitter; Twettle

Just a short note on my Twitter series of posts! I thought i'd let you know about this tweeting kettle...or Twettle (seeing as it is on the title..). I ...

2010-04-21T00:00:00.000Z 21st April 2010

Twitter; Twintergration

Twitter, Twitter Twitter. How you have taken over the world? (And my life?) I have recently properly got into Twitter. Before it was just a laborious update to show I ...

2010-04-20T00:00:00.000Z 20th April 2010

Covers and Remixes

I have always been a music fan. Playing violin from the age of 7 and progressing onto guitar, the musical world has always intrigued me.

2009-01-29T00:00:00.000Z 29th January 2009

Geeks

I feel geeks are somewhat underestimated in the continuum of time and space. But, in reality, they are amazing. I'm not ashamed to admit I'm a geek.

2009-01-28T00:00:00.000Z 28th January 2009

To Know or Not To Know

Knowledge is a powerful thing. I can turn worlds into war, it can turn people to power, and it can turn children to critics, humans into inhabitants. Its one of ...

2009-01-27T00:00:00.000Z 27th January 2009

Thoughts...

Thoughts are someone’s heart, someone’s soul, someone’s hero trapped inside the body of their worshiper, their disciple, and their devotee. Thoughts can make someone’s day, someone ...