User:Straydogstrut.co.uk
Introduction
Daniel Mclaughlan
Pronouns: he/him
nature lover. soft hiker. cosy gamer. vegan. mutant and proud. married to an author, owned by a cat.
Chat Nickname: straydogstrut
Hello! I'm Daniel or Dan (your preference). I've been writing on the web about my interests since at least 2004. I'm a digital accessibility specialist by trade, working in higher education. When I'm not working I'm exploring my creative pursuits in illustration, animation, web development and games design. I also keep an allotment for some much needed headspace.
My Website
My current website is hosted at https://straydogstrut.co.uk and remains focused on my interests and my reflections.
My earliest experience of web development was Windows Notepad, Microsoft Frontpage, and a Lycos Tripod website that I can no longer remember the name of.
However, I've had a personal blog under the straydogstrut identity since 2004, initially on Blogger then later Wordpress, both the hosted and self-hosted versions. I formally purchased the domain name in August 2008.
My most active years were 2004 through 2007, and again in 2015 - 2019. However, I stopped blogging entirely in 2022, before rediscovering the personal web in 2024, when I briefly relaunched my website with Eleventy, then Micro.blog, then Grav.. and finally Statamic. It took some time for me to find the right fit(!)
Technology
My website is built using Statamic and deployed from GitHub thanks to Laravel Forge.
The look and feel of my site is a very heavily customised implementation of the Starter's Creek Starter Kit
IndieWeb Posts
- https://straydogstrut.co.uk/posts/2024/11/06/a-manifesto-for-my-personal-site
- https://straydogstrut.co.uk/posts/2024/10/27/rediscovering-a-more-personal-web
IndieWeb community projects
I contributed some web dev skills to the Internet Archive Zine: a volunteer-led initiative to raise money for the Internet Archive.
The story so far
- added IndieAuth using selfauth [30/06/2025]
- added OpenGraph image [14/06/2025]
- updated taxonomies [12/06/2025]
- lots of template tweaking [02/04/2025 - 08/06/2025]
- setup a Statamic site [20/03/2025]
Current Focus
Migrating my silo'd content elsewhere to my site as dedicated collections.
Snagging list
- improve my RSS feed
- add a Site Map
- add Microformats to my site (e.g. h-card, h-entry )
- enable webmentions, if possible