Hello

Hey, I'm Matt, a sysadmin, and this website is a cross between an experiment that is ever changing (and documented in the /changelog of course,) a blog, technical guides and a dumping ground for some often rambling opinions about stuff and things, mostly about life on and offline, but also involving tech things too. Particularly the indieweb, the UK education space, and infosec, but I'll also touch on other areas occasionally. Heck, I may even publish a few /tools every now and then.

If you wanna know more, check out my /story, or perhaps you wish see what I'm doing /now? If that doesn't interest you, take a look at some of my favourite places on the internet to /wander to. If you don't like the look of this site, try changing it with some /themes I've built! You are also, of course, free to hit me up and say /hello at any time.

Posts

Here's a list of posts I've written:

2025-02-20 - Intentionally Left Blank
Why did I make an intentionally blank page on this website?
2025-02-19 - SPF And DMARC At Primary Schools
What's the state of email SPF and DMARC records in UK primary schools? Spoiler: It's... not too great?
2025-02-18 - Prioritising Many Projects
We've had a huge workload placed upon our shoulders, but existing methods of organising unplanned and planned work didn't quite scale to something so massive. I needed a new system. This is what I came up with.
2025-02-13 - Website Carbon
According to websitecarbon.com, this site is rated as A+ for carbon emission efficiency! Neat.
2025-02-10 - Chickens
We had to look after 10 three-day-old chicks over the weekend. Initially I wasn't too fussed one way or the other about them... but I think there may be pet chickens in my future
2025-02-09 - Passion Projects
The writer of Hamilton - Lin-Manuel Miranda - has something to say about passion projects which really struck me
2024-10-22 - The Afternoon Of Bedtime
Kids are great. They certainly do invent some interesting concepts... sometimes they happen across an idea which is somewhat mind bending but also entirely cute
2024-09-09 - Theme: Paper
I've made a new theme for the site, paper. It's super simple and minimal!
2024-08-28 - Indieweb Vs Indie Web
I've been thinking about the IndieWeb and the Indie web after reading a great post by @starbreaker. Here are some of my thoughts on the matter
2024-08-21 - The Joy Of The Internet Slow Lane
I had (hardly) any internet on a weekend away and I was forced into the slow lane. It was glorious, I tell you!
2024-08-15 - Post Reply: Css Style
The legendary FlamedFury asks what people name their CSS stylesheet in small web projects. This is my answer!
2024-08-14 - Welcome To The Fediverse
I'm on the fediverse, with all the cool kids!
2024-08-04 - Reader Feedback On Readability And Css Hyphens
A reader emailed me some feedback about an issue they noticed when reading the content on this site
2024-08-03 - Tomatoes And Anthropomorphising Buildings
After years of trying and saving, we've finally replaced our failing sewage system with a brand new one! Yipee! Now we can get on with stuff. Like growing food!
2024-07-26 - Windows93 Net
Why build an OS when you can build a fake OS that runs in a browser and spend years adding pointless but fun stuff to it for no reaosn other than 'teh lulz'?!
2024-07-25 - The Month Of Illness
Things are keeping me away from this site. Grr.
2024-06-14 - Css Naked Day
Websites can be naked too! 9th April is CSS naked day, where websites wear no clothes!
2024-06-04 - Then Pages
We've got /now pages, but I wanted a way to archive them. So I have added a /then page!
2024-05-21 - Themes
I've added theme support!
2024-05-11 - Aurora Redux
More Aurora! Whoa!
2024-05-10 - Aurora
The Aurora was visible and it kinda blew me away a bunch? Here's some crappy pictures :)
2024-05-07 - Yep And Nope Pages
I saw Jack Baty's nope list and just had to add my own. So I did. But then I realised they were all negative-outlook-esque? And that just won't do.
2024-05-01 - Indieweb H-cards
I've been playing with h-cards and have incorporated the concept into this site
2024-04-26 - Rss For The Win
I've added (back) the RSS feed after migrating off Wordpress and onto this pile of spaghetti code that I call my new website! Yay!
2024-04-18 - A New Website For An Old Web
I've only gone and scrapped a perfectly functioning website and replaced it with a probably-broken mess of my own facerolling-on-keyboard code that SOMEHOW lets you read this. Don't ask how. Don't look too closely.
2024-03-03 - Reset Sims Net Password
We have established that Sims.Net sucks. It may, however, be the chosen Suck of your environment. If so, and you need to reset the sysman account password, I got you.
2023-11-08 - Useless Windows Bug 5462
A little bug I noticed in Windows Server
2023-10-18 - Vms Not Booting After October 2023 Windows Updates
Booting a VM and you get the error 'Failed to power on with Error Incorrect Function' after the 2023-10 updates? Yeah, this hit us too. Here's how to fix it
2023-10-12 - Migrate Sims Net Server
Sims.Net sucks. It's an undocumented mess of garbage and confusion. If you need to migrate it to another server, here's how!
2023-06-30 - Implement But Never Move
I really appreciate well-written implementation guides for server-client software, but what really gets me excited is seeing migration guides. But I hate intentionally paywalling this kind of stuff. Grrrr.
2023-06-19 - Duct Tape
How could you identify where to focus your efforts outside of break-fix work? RachelByTheBay has the answer.
2023-01-30 - Receiving Unsolicited Blogging Advice
How can you post stuff when you worry about the stuff you post not being good enough?
2023-01-30 - Interruptions In Tech Support
In my opinion, interruptions are the death of effective technical support and, in particular, project work. Here's how I try to limit it
2022-03-22 - Don't Trust Copy And Paste Even With JavaScript Disabled
Copying and pasting from some random website is dangerous. Lots of people are recommending that you disable JavaScript to protect against this. However, not only does that break almost every website ever, it also doesn't actually prevent the issue. Here's how you can trick someone into running malicious code via copy/paste WITHOUT JavaScript
2021-12-31 - Light-up Spinning Top In The Dark
Pretty lights!
2021-08-11 - Tales From Tech Support 02 The Server Room Is Nuts
One month, three problems. Each special in their own way. Water and nuts are involved.
2021-07-21 - Error B8bb2b3e On Hp Office Jet Pro 8710
have you go the error code b8bb2b3e on an HP Office Jet Pro 8710? Here's how to fix it
2021-07-14 - Kaseya Says Yes
Kaseya done goofed. Sigh. Things won't change
2021-07-12 - Visitor Information Disclosure In Wp-statistics
There's a visitor information disclosure in WP-Statistics - you should probably upgrade and search your web directory for the leaky file!
2021-04-23 - Glpi Ripe For The Injecting
Vulnerable versions of GLPI report back to GLPI, who publish that data on their site for some reason?
2021-02-08 - Iced
I love how ice looks when it forms on something smooth and flat like glass
2020-07-25 - Tales From Tech Support 01 Percussive Maintenance
Sometimes kicking the shit out of something that is broken fixes it
2020-07-23 - Ditching Glpi
As we learned recently, GLPI sucks more than we realised. Let's just ditch it.
2020-05-30 - Haveibeenpwned Com Pwned Our Helpdesk Glpi 9 4 5 Sql Injection
an email from Have I Been Pwned completely wiped out our GLPI (helpdesk) database through the simplest SQLi ever
2020-05-22 - G Suite Migration For Outlook Error 0x8004106b
G Suite Migration for Outlook showing Error 0x8004106b? Here's the reason why - Aliases. Yup.
2019-09-04 - Sims Net Is Slow
Sims.Net sucks - it's slow, it's bad, it's old. But... there is one way to potentially speed it up
2019-07-31 - Boiler High Heat
I like a simple fix, the simpler the better. And what's better than 'turn the tap on'?
2019-07-29 - Witholding Number On External Calls On Avaya Ip Office R5 Manager
Here's how to withhold the number on external calls on the Avaya IP Office r5 manager