Why write publicly? I’ve asked myself this question at least once a year, and my answer gets easier every year—no one cares.
Writing, for me, is a tool to organize my thoughts and process them. It’s also a log for me to remember and look back on to see how I’ve progressed over the years. But writing is a lonely hobby. If there is a limited audience, then what is the point? Put it into an email or a text message and be done with it, right?
Writing online with my domain, my website, and a server can be expensive. It doesn’t have to be, but I choose this over a third-party host and give up all of my rights, privacy, and autonomy.
Social media is not an option for those same reasons.
Social internet is an answer, but it takes too much time to build.
The hardest part of blogging, sharing my passions or thoughts, doesn’t always mean the people closest to you care to read them. Then the doubt creeps in, “Well, if they don’t care, why would anyone else? Why am I doing this, and putting myself out there?”
So, I do what I always do, which is to write for me first, and just hope that maybe someone else might find something of value in there. But over time I just became so frustrated with it all, I am going to close my website down and just go back to journaling for a while.
This new website has been designated as a repository for a small set of images to be stored online instead of an expensive third-party photo hosting site (see ya, Flickr!). The actual photo archives are numbered to almost 50,000 images, so only a select few are chosen to be represented on this site. While you are there, take a look around inside the archives!
This is an extension to my main portfolio website that can be clicked here or in the nav bar up top.
I have not yet begun to upload images to this photo archive site and will do so throughout the next week. Okay, maybe one or two of my favorite subject:
Parsing an exported .json file into something readable like a plain .txt format is proving troublesome. These are old posts that need to be translated and then migrated over to the Archives site since they were not imported due to these .json errors.
Unfortunately, there has been no easy solution. It is all copy/paste and manually removing the gratuitous code, then format it properly and then copy/paste and date manually into the Archives.
Microblogging is a combination of blogging and instant messaging that allows users to create short messages to be posted and shared with an audience online. Social platforms like X (formerly Twitter) have become extremely popular forms of this type of blogging. These short messages can come in a variety of content formats including text, images, video, audio, and hyperlinks.
Formerly known as a “Quickie” tag here, I’ve re-assigned a “Micro” tag to every microblogging post I published. Again, think Twitter but without the algorithm and adverts. If you only want to see these quick snippets then, I have generated a “Micro” page at the top of this website. Or, click on the two lines in the upper right hand corner on your mobile. This will display a collection of Micro posts to date.
Over the past few weeks, I have retired the silver fox website and migrated everything over from the last 23(!) years to an Archived website for posterity. I purchased a new domain name (chrisdenbow.website) that matches my own because I had allowed someone else to snatch up the old one (R.I.P. chrisdenbow.website). If you type in the old web address, it will redirect into an Icelandic online betting site. The internet is weird.
Moving on, I built this website here from the ground up. I took some old code, improved it, streamlined that code and made it sexier. It’s just like baking a cake but in this regard, you can add or take out the ingredients in whichever way or order to what makes sense to you. I then uploaded all to my test server, broke it, rewrote and tried again. Success. Then everything was migrated to the Ghost server, imported a few old posts to help get it going, and pushed send. ChrisDenbow.website was born.
Now I think I stop the futzing and putzing after these past few weeks and enjoy.
For the past twenty+ years, I have bounced in/out of different platforms and formats, tried my hand at coding and designing something that made me happy. Because if you are going to invest decades into something you enjoy, it damn well needs a decent platform to showcase it. Those decades were all a learning experience, and it brought me here.
All that to say that this website will be my own small slice of the WWW for a long time.
A long time ago I created a website for my daughter to document her growth. Over time, though, it was neglected and shelved. I came across an .xml file containing a few posts but not all of them so I built a new website archive, added some images from the photo archives that didn’t migrate over and boom, it’s back.
I regret not keeping up with this among all of the other regrets.
So for now, her early works are back and hopefully in the future we can build a proper, modern telling of her beautiful story.
“Lastly, if there’s anything I can convince you of: you should build a personal site, you should obsess over it, you should meticulously document it, and you should have quite a bit of fun doing so. (It’s worth it.)”
While migrating old web articles I have published in/out of databases, there are standard formats that should be universal or compatible with others. The issue I am having is that when exporting old data from a .json formatted document, I run into a long string of data objects that are not readable. Other examples or .xml data that is difficult to convert as well.
JSON viewer
All of that to say I am having difficulty migrating old writing into my Archives due to incompatible file formats. This is why I prefer .txt files that are easily readable and future-proofed. Meaning, the file will be compatible for generations after I am gone. But noooo…we have to use .json and .xml with no easy way to convert them.
So now I have to parse each article, cut/paste into the Archives one-by-one manually. There are 374 of these. Damn.
A better part of the day was spent looking for .xml files that contain my old blog posts. I managed to find posts from 2006-2010 and then migrate those to another website as a semi-permanent record. 2010-2023 coming as soon as I import them into the new archive database. I am missing five years worth from 2001-2005 due to the fact that I lost the 3.5″ floppy disk during a move and never copied or backed it up anywhere else.
💻
Ideally, I’d love to have everything in one place on this current website here but, the current server configuration would shit the bed and I don’t want to deal with that mess right now.
The Archives can be found by clicking the Archives link in the menu above this article or here: https://cjdarchives.website
When trying something new, it is okay to feel uncertain and hesitant, right? Well here I go anyway.
Connect-
My content lives here, on my one-man publishing house. Everything here is under my control and it’s then dispersed through three distribution channels.
The first, and most obvious, is the world wide web itself. My content is distributed to you via the Internet. You can ask your browser to get this page you’re reading right now and get access to my content.
The second is RSS. You can tell your RSS reader to fetch the content available on my website and you can then consume my content inside your app of choice.
The final one is email. I send my newsletter via email because some people prefer to stay up to date that way as well as reply back with further comments and discussion.
These three methods only take care of distribution and distribution of content is only part of the equation. You then have interaction. The point of putting content out there is to connect, to interact with others, to exchange ideas, and to grow. And interactions, through my website domain, happen mostly through comments on an article here or by email.
Support-
In the past twenty-two years that I have owned a website, never, not once, have I subjected anyone to spam, affiliate links or advertising. It’s repugnant and distracts from the messages I want to get across. Nothing has changed in that regard. You now have the option to support me and this website (self hosting costs aren’t cheap,) in many ways such as contributing to the conversation in the posts, adding me to your RSS feed readers and by dropping me a line into my e-mail inbox to hello@chrisdenbow.website.
After all these years of building websites and working on side projects, I realized that this is the only way for me to approach the whole donations/monetization part of what I do. $0 per month gives you access to the articles and newsletters I post. If you want to support for $5 or $10/month for all that plus extras, that’s awesome as well. I’d be grateful either way and your kindness won’t go unnoticed.
Between you and me, there is no obligation and I certainly don’t have an expectant hand out, but the options are out there now.
The restoration and rebranding of my portfolio website is now complete. Formerly known as “Silver Fox Photography” at silverfox.photography, it is back again to photodenbow.com. Now when you click on the Photography page at the top here, it will redirect you to the new website. Go check it out if inclined.
Like any new move there is going to be some things that are unpacked such as my archives that go back to 2001, a few design tweaks (like fresh coats of paint, wallpapering), and the constant re-arranging of furniture.
While I wanted the previous Silver Fox persona to shield my privacy and anonymity, it was a fun experiment but that was the problem, it wasn’t me. Since 2001, this website was all about me. I wrote it for myself first, but people eventually tagged along and joined me as I threw my life out there. Then the guests grew to almost a thousand visitors coming and going as they pleased and I was trying to be a good host but it didn’t matter. More on that later, but now, it is time for a tour of the new place. Yes, I know I write this for myself, but eventually I will have guests, so why be rude and not show them around?
First stop, the Pages
As my website analytics show (don’t worry, I don’t track or use this information for nefarious reasons, that’s rude), most people come to visit on their mobile devices. If this is you, then you are able to click the two horizontal bars in the upper right hand corner. This is the menu bar that displays all of the pages. If you are visiting on a computer, which I suggest to get the full effect, the menu bar is up top in the middle. Up first, is the Archives.
Menu Bar as seen on mobile devicePage view on mobile device
Archives
A backlog of articles from 2001 to present. Coming soon.
Bookshelf (formerly The Library)
Since this website is all about me, you get to have a peak into my life such as what I am reading or have read in the recent past. In here I have a list of books of 24 books in 2024 to read. I have read five so far and I am ahead of the curve so far and have even given them a 1-5 star review. You’ll also see what I am currently reading and down below, books I have re-shelved after use.
Colophon
The Colophon page tells a story of how this website has been designed, updated and by which tools I have used to create. Along with a contact section to reach out to me. I love emails and I love responding to them even more. This helps make my site better so feel free to drop me a line to hello @ chrisdenbow.website
Photography
When you click on this page, it will automatically re-direct you to my digital photography studio website, SilverFox Photography. Yes, eventually I will want to move that back to photodenbow.com, but that will be further down the road. Until then, take a look at my photo portfolio while there? But bookmark that for later, because there is more of this new home to show you.
Podcast (formerly The FoxCast)
It wouldn’t do to have a Foxcast when that old site goes away, would it? Say hello to the Radio Denbow podcast. The format is still the same, however. Photography, book reviews, geocaching or anything else I find interesting, all in 5 minutes or less.
Read.me (formerly About)
In software development, a Read.me file is a small text file that is part instruction manual and part introduction to the code writer of that software. Here, it is a little insight about me.
Home
Clicking this will simply bring you back to the front door of the website.
On Desktop
If you are not visiting with your mobile device but on a computer instead, you will enjoy a much better view. All the pages are on display at the top, the images are wider and more visibly pleasing.
Desktop view of website
RSS Feed
There are multiple ways to consume this website and all can be enjoyable, one of these is called Really Simple Syndication (RSS.) All of my websites have the ability to send code to a feed aggregator into the feed reader of your choice. I use both FeedBin and Reeder. Think of them as a podcast player but for text. Mine is chrisdenbow.website/rss/ so every time I post an article here, you do not have to come back to this website, you can read it in your feed reader, along with all the other websites you have chosen to enjoy with no ads, no tracking. RSS is the backbone of the old internet and is still thriving to this day. Advertisers hate it because they haven’t figured out how to monetize it after all these years.
Easy subscription form.
Subscription
That word, subscription, has bad connotations these days, but not here, no way. If you want to stay up on the latest articles, you can have them delivered to your email inbox instead. As I have always said, no spam. No advertising. No B.S. not ever. Your information and privacy never leaves my web server or will get sold.
By subscribing, you also have the ability to leave a comment on any web article. I highly encourage this. The internet, the WWW, was founded on websites. The social web, not social media is where it is at. It was done by linking to each other and commenting on everyone’s own website. If you like an article, tell me! If you want to share something related to an article, then please do!
Subscription options for commenting, and receiving articles. Please do so.
Newsletter
By subscribing, you will have access to a special email, one article that is separate from the website. A blend of text and photography that doesn’t have a place on either my text or photography websites. It will be more personal.
Successful test of a published newsletter. Apologies for the goofy-ass image, it WAS a test
Navigation
Search Feature- if you click the magnifying glass, you can search by topic and it will pull up any article using that reference.
If you click on an article category such as “Reading” or “Journal” or “Photography” in an article it will display all articles that have been referenced.
Category reference and search features
Finally, at the bottom of every article, there are 1-3 other articles of interest to prompt you to read if interested.
ChrisDenbow.website is managed on a virtual Ghost server and maintained by myself.
The color mode does automatically shift between day and night modes for easier reading. I am proud of that particular feature 🙂
The colors and fonts used here are inspired by the Mercedes Formula 1 racing team.
Man, that is a sexy car.
Change Log & Version History
24-02-11: Version 1.0 installed onto Ghost server
I was listening to this brilliant and technically perfect album while editing this article:
The idea of creating a brand new, anonymous digital identity was a good idea, until I decided it wasn’t. This wasn’t the first time I have flipped/flopped from a generic and private website, back to a domain with my own name in it. Currently it is silverfox.website. And now, I have decided that it is time to revert to what you see here, chrisdenbow.website. After recent price increases, subscription fatigue, privacy concerns and probably long overdue contentment, it’s time for a change. I’ll be withdrawing more from technology, technology blogs and restructuring everything to maximize privacy, reduce monthly subscription spending and pursuing avenues of personal interest.
I am heavily embedded into the Apple eco-system after decades of using Windows/Android. I have stuff scattered all over the internet, cloud storage and external hard drives with almost zero organization. That’s changing as of today.
I purchased a new web (chrisdenbow.website) and email address (hello AT chrisdenbow.website) to match it and then made THAT one the new/updated Apple ID. The hard part is switching everything from contact information to businesses and services I use over to the new account. Sure, I’ll lose a lot of subscriptions, but I am pairing them down and prioritizing anyway.
With iCloud+ services such as Private Relay and “Hide My Email” I can create generic, disposable email addresses. Apple then allows me to use random, generic passwords and will even store them for me using their KeyChain.
When all of this is sorted I need to discipline myself to keep it organized, unlike my previous attempts. Maybe then I can get back to enjoying what I love in peace such as photography, reading and geocaching.
This post was written with this song playing in the background:
Aaaaand to ring in the new year I have done a little redecorating to the website by adding new layouts, fonts and colors. The colors are lifted inspired by the Mercedes Formula 1 team colors
I spent some time cleaning up this website with the backend protocols, database and overall performances. It is streamlined and ready for the new year which is great because I plan on tweaking some more coding and giving it a fresh coat of paint soon.
