A growing collection of articles, ideas, comparisons and useful resources about PHP development, UX design, SEO, websites and digital products.
Browse focused articles about Web Development, the ideas, decisions and challenges behind building digital products.
Launching a website can expose problems that were almost invisible during development. From confusing navigation and premature technology choices to SEO, performance and maintenance, here are the mistakes that often become obvious only after a business website starts being used.
A website may look like a collection of pages, but underneath it is a network of templates, URLs, databases, content relationships and backend systems. Using Cordinant as a real example, I look at website architecture from a non-developer perspective and explain what is actually happening behind the pages visitors see.
I wanted to reduce automated submissions on the Cordinant contact form without making every visitor complete a CAPTCHA. The solution became a combination of small server-side checks: CSRF protection, a honeypot, submission timing, validation and rate limiting.
I expected products and blog articles to need completely separate systems. Building the custom CMS behind Cordinant showed me something different: beneath their specialised fields and layouts, they shared much of the same structure. Recognising that pattern changed how I thought about the CMS, and about software architecture more generally.
An MVP can help you test an idea quickly, but releasing the smallest possible product is not always the best approach. This article explores MVPs, full products, prototypes, hidden development work, early launches and the difficult question of how much really needs to exist before version one is ready.
Self-hosted software and SaaS often appear to solve the same problems, yet they represent very different approaches to ownership, responsibility and product development. This article explores how both models work, why each has strengths and limitations, and why the right choice depends more on business goals than technology.
A collection of practical articles, product ideas, and resources on technical research, development, SEO and content for anyone interested in creating websites, apps and digital products.
PHP architecture, project structure, deployment and reusable solutions.
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Explore articlesThe principles discussed in these articles are applied in real self-hosted products, not only described in theory.
A self-hosted PHP and MySQL personal finance application with transactions, reports, goals, exports and an installer.
View My Budget →An offline-first marine operations PWA with voyages, fuel, maintenance, crew records, checklists and optional PHP backup tools.
View Captain's Toolkit →Browse installable PHP applications, self-hosted starter kits and practical developer tools created with the same principles discussed in the blog.