FeedCity

Accounts of one’s personal website – from the story of why one started a website to the decisions made and lessons learned while making and using the site – are plentiful. Rightfully so. I love reading others’ perspectives on websites, too. I love writing about my website. It...

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. Man...

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.

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 s...

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 I visit coffee shops, I like to take notes of things that I appreciate about their design, as well as wishes for what would improve my experience in the coffee shop. Most of these notes are scattered throughout the forest that is my digital notebook, so I thought I would...

Manuel who runs the wonderful People and Blogs interview series has taken over Blogroll.org from Ray. I have visited Blogroll.org many times when in search for new links to explore. I am grateful to both Ray for starting and maintaining the project, and for Manuel continuing ...

When I am designing URLs, I consider whether a URL is something that would be easy to understand if heard aloud. This does not need to apply to all URLs – for example, I wouldn’t mention a post URL verbally – but it does apply to many pages, like a contact page or an about pa...

MJ, my blog mascot, has the unique ability of being able to balance coffee cups on his head while upside down. This is reflected in a design concept I made last year for my blog. In experimenting with new article layouts, I thought about what it would be like to have MJ stick to the side of the screen as the user scrolled. Then I thought what if MJ rotated! Here is MJ at the point that proves his magic coffee cup doesn’t spill: The MJ cat mascot upside down with an arrow pointing at it that has the message “a magic coffee cup that doesn’t spill”. This is the only feature in the sidebar. The sidebar is next to the main article text. I, on the other hand, regularly spill coffee. You can view the web page and its source code if you want to take a peek to see how the scroll-based animation works!

After pressing Send on an email to a friend this evening, my email client opened a window which read You wrote “I have attached”, but no attachment has been added. Do you want to send your message anyway?. Without this feature, I would have sent the email and likely forgotten...

I thought I’d try something different and write not about a snippet of my day but the day in full – almost like a journal. I started the day with reading. I’m reading Goodnight Tokyo, a fiction book about a Tokyo taxi driver and the stories of the people he drives around the...

Photography-wise I’ve been fairly unmotivated recently: no posting, no development, no scanning and only taking few photos. But today was finally a good day again: I spent the whole day outside in the sun with the family and friends while shooting two rolls of Foma 100 with my Lomo LC-A.

For the IndieWeb Movie Club I watched 1997’s The Castle IWC April 2025: hosted by Zachary Kai Usually I will read and research before seeing a film. I don’t mind spoilers. So a trailer and a wikipedia synopsis would be a first step. For this, I took it on faith that it’d be worthwhile. The...

Zachary and I recently worked on a collaborative writing project in which we prompted each other to share impressions of an artwork of the other’s choosing. Zachary chose a painting for me to write about. I chose one for Zachary to write about. Below is what we wrote. James’ ...

I had never noticed the sapling with blossom. It was slightly obscured by an old stone wall. The pink made the tree stand out. I have looked in that direction many times, but my focus is usually captured by the gothic architecture or the green trees of spring and summer. Toda...

I was out in the sunset again this evening. I set off a bit later than yesterday. At the beginning of my walk, I looked to the sun – which would not set over the hills for at least an hour – and thought about where it was this time yesterday. I am now thinking about how my gr...

Today I’m making public my little film development web app: https://dt.danielpietzsch.com.

I appreciate being out in the sunset I thought to myself on the final stretch of my evening walk. I thought back to all the times during the pandemic when I would go out for a walk in the evenings. Every day, almost without fail, I would be out for a walk, enjoying the last m...

With the warm, sunny weather that we have had recently, I have twice visited a coffee shop in the evenings. A decaf flat white is my order — my standard after 3pm. Evening walks in the sun feel different. The obligations of the day fade away with each step. I enjoy the way t...