Setting Up the Raspberry Pi That Took Three Months to Arrive
A walkthrough of finally getting my long-delayed Raspberry Pi board up and running, from imaging the SD card to first boot, including the power supply mistake nobody warns you about.
Tutorials
Tutorials
Optimizing Images for the Web (So Your Site Doesn't Take Forever to Load)
A practical rundown of picking the right image format, actually compressing your files, and other basic tricks to keep your page weight down for visitors still on slow connections.
Git Branches, Without Losing Your Mind
A follow-up to the basic Git post from a couple months back — this time covering branches: creating them, merging them, deleting them, and a simple workflow that actually keeps master clean.
Regex for People Who Keep Copy-Pasting It Off Forums
A no-nonsense intro to regular expressions for beginners, with two patterns you'll actually use: trimming whitespace and validating an email address.
Getting Started with CSS Media Queries
A hands-on walkthrough of CSS media queries and basic responsive breakpoints, prompted by rebuilding this blog's layout after testing it on an iPhone 4S and a new Kindle Fire.
Setting Up a Cron Job to Automate Your Backups
A walkthrough of setting up a cron job on a Linux server to automate a nightly backup script, including the gotchas around cron's stripped-down environment and silent failures.
JavaScript Closures, With Actual Examples
A practical look at JavaScript closures using two real examples: a private click counter and the classic loop-variable bug that trips up almost everyone at some point.
Setting Up Self-Hosted WordPress (Finally Wrote This Down)
A walkthrough of moving to self-hosted WordPress: picking a cheap host, the actual install process (five-click or manual), and choosing a first theme.
Poking Around jQuery Mobile 1.0
A hands-on first look at jQuery Mobile 1.0, which just went final: getting the files linked up, building a simple data-role page, and a few gotchas I hit along the way.
A Simple PHP Contact Form (That Doesn't Get You Hacked)
A quick, no-framework PHP tutorial for building a contact form that emails you, with basic server-side validation and a fix for the email header injection hole most beginner tutorials skip.
Ditching Flash: A Practical HTML5 Video Tag Tutorial
A practical walkthrough of the HTML5 video tag: multiple source formats, poster images, and why you still need a fallback for browsers (and clients) that won't cooperate.
Git Basics: Stop Emailing Yourself Zip Files
A beginner-friendly walkthrough of git init, add, and commit, and why emailing yourself zip files of your code is a habit you need to break right now.