Journal
Articles Filed Under "Technical"
Tips for minimising cloud computing costs
Cloud computing has become an essential component of modern businesses, providing flexibility, scalability, and cost-effectiveness. […]
GDPR principles and your web site
There’s a large amount of scaremongering about GDPR doing the rounds, especially by companies trying to sell expensive compliance ‘solutions’ Do you know what GDPR is? I’m pretty sure that many visitors to the CST website will at least have a vague idea. […]
The best SEO advice I can give you
There are so many so-called "SEO Experts" out there, but it's strange how, if you google "SEO Expert" none of them ever appear on the front page. […]
Marston’s PLC Responsive Re-Build
If you look back over our previous journal entries you might note a couple of recurring themes: Websites that are ranked highly by Sitemorse, and Responsive Design. […]
Fluid Vs Fixed Width Design
Fluid designs are making a comeback on the web, but are they holding us back or allowing us to move forward? With the coming device zombie apocalypse it's no surprise that many people working in the industry are both excited and yet daunted by the future. […]
The Baseline Grid & Vertical Rhythm
Just how important is the baseline grid and does it have any relevance on the web today? In the words of Robert Bringhurst who wrote The Elements of Typographic Style (many designers’ typography bible. […]
Not All Touch-Screens Are Created Equal
If you look at the specifications of touch screen phones, tablets, and even some touch screen PCs you’ll notice the terms Capacitive and Resistive used. […]
Another Day Another Browser! Here Comes Internet Explorer 8
Fearing their new browser would break too many sites Microsoft have introduced "compatibility view". […]
Dating Game
One of the biggest hassles for any programmer in any language is working with date formats. […]
Pros and Cons of Form Filling
A frequent query in the various scripting newsgroups concerns how to handle forms that are split over multiple pages. […]
PHP Query
Gary from Leatherhead emailed to say that he's an ASP programmer trying to learn PHP, and has run into a couple of problems with the equals sign. […]
Scripting - Part 2
Last month we looked at Perl, the oldest Web scripting language, and Visual Basic Active Server Pages, one of the most common. […]
We are all going mad
Recently, an interesting email turned up from the folks who run mad. […]
Scripting - Part 1
Welcome to a brand-new Real World column that isn't really new at all. […]
To Frame or not
'Should I use frames on my site?' A common question, and one where the answers usually range from 'You should never use frames,' through to, 'I quite like frames, actually'. […]
Forums
A few months ago we explained how to add a newsfeed to your site to keep it fresh. […]
Splish Splash
The other day, a friend asked for advice on how to set a time-out on the splash page on his site. […]
Email slaves
There was a time, and it wasn't that long ago, when the average chief technical officer (CTO) spent his mornings reading emails, lunchtimes 'doing lunch' and the afternoons reading emails that had arrived during lunch. […]
Setting up Home
Dave from Glasgow emailed to ask if there was some JavaScript which he could use to enable visitors to set his site as their home page. […]
More DOS Site Monitoring
Oh, the irony! We write about a really nasty task - something that, frankly, we'd like to forget about - and it generates a record volume of email. […]
Is this site secure
As you might have read in the news a few months back, some credit card companies are amending their terms and conditions to insist that their cards may only be used on the Internet to make purchases from 'secure' sites. […]
Chopping logs
We received an interesting email from Arturo of Bristol, asking if we could help explain the data in his NT4 IIS server log files. […]
Spam Tracing
It's been a month of email problems. […]
ASP email handling
It's a favourite trick of ours, which we've shown you before in this column, to send an email message from a Web page using just six lines of ASP code. […]
DOS Site Monitoring
All of our clients are lovely, but sometimes they can be difficult, and this month one lot in particular has been more difficult than most. […]
When sites go bad
As we write this column, news has just come in about how the giant US-based on-line auction site, eBay (www. […]
Fast Serve
As well as total failure, your armoury of useful tools should be able to address performance issues too. […]
Speed Scripting
Barry Nile emailed us to say that he had recently upgraded his Web site, adding some of the ASP database techniques that we showed a few months ago, but now his site is a lot slower. […]
Site Research
Would you buy a house without first having a full structural survey done? Probably not - unfortunately Paul once did exactly this and he still has the dry rot to prove it. […]
An inexact science
While we're on the subject of hits and page impressions, we've pointed out before that many of the tools used for analysing server log files are, how shall we put this politely, somewhat suspect in quality. […]
Web Databases
Time and time again we get asked 'How do I connect my Web site to a database?', and like most good questions there's no single correct answer. […]
Jumping Java Jive
Reader David Netter writes: 'I use a dropdown list for site navigation, but at the moment it requires the user to select a page and then press a Go! button. […]
Second Line, Second ISP?
If you host your Web sites in-house, it's a certain bet that at some stage your leased line will start to fill up and need to be upgraded. […]
Java Navigation Frames
Last month we touched on frame navigation and how to refresh multiple frames with a single mouse click. […]
DIY Certificates
Last month we looked at securing your Web site with usernames and passwords, and now we move on to digital IDs and certificates. […]
Security Matters
Let's talk security. […]
Domain Dilemma
John Stewart, marketing director of a video firm, emailed us to ask, 'Where should I register my domains?' There are a number of domain registries around the world (for a reasonably complete list see www. […]
Domain Pain
There's been much talk in the Internet press recently about the new Top Level Domains (aka TLD's): . […]
Watching The Defectives
If you look after or host Web sites for clients, there's one certainty: if the site is ever unavailable, the client will be trying to view it at exactly that time. […]
Art Attack
Let's leave servers aside for a moment and take a look at an issue which will affect anyone implementing a large Web site, especially if it's being created as a team effort. […]
Scripting
Many people are rather afraid of scripting, which is hardly surprising as it's such a vast area with a lot to understand. […]
An IIS Gotcha
We recently had a problem with a Web site hosted on an IIS server, and that makes heavy use of session variables to track what the user's doing. […]
…The team at CST seem to instinctively understand the needs of our business.
— Mike McMinn, IT Director at Marston's PLC.