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Notes from the Riksi studio in Melbourne. Plain guides on WordPress, Shopify, front-end code, speed and the tools I use every day.

Lesson Explainers Windows XP turns 25: the little green hill Windows XP went on sale 25 years ago this October. Why it mattered, how huge it got, the story of that green hill, and three XP tricks that still work today. November 1, 2026 7 min read

A product web page with a warm heatmap glow over its most-clicked button

Guide Marketing Heatmaps: watch what your visitors really do Stop guessing. With a free tool and ten minutes, watch where visitors click, scroll and quit on your site. Plus the three tools compared, and the privacy step to get right. October 31, 2026 7 min read

A phone with its website screen smeared and swirling in a dizzy motion blur, while the phone itself stays sharp

Dev log Accessibility Reduce motion: kinder animations for every visitor Site animation is nice, but it makes some people dizzy. Keep your motion, let people turn it off, and switch it off for anyone who asks. Here's how. October 28, 2026 7 min read

HubSpot and Xero logos joined by a two-way arrow labelled contacts, products, invoices and payments, over a photo of a desk

Guide Site upgrades Connect HubSpot to Xero: invoices and contacts in sync Deals in HubSpot turn into Xero invoices, and payments come back. You'll know the free app's setup order, what it syncs, and the limits to plan around. October 24, 2026 4 min read

Dev log Security PHP2Shell explained: check and fix your PHP in plain English Two critical PHP bugs let attackers take over sites with no password. What happened in plain words, a checker for your PHP version, and how to fix it. October 23, 2026 27 min read

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Stripe and Xero logos joined by an arrow labelled card payments, fees and payouts, over a photo of a receipt roll and a ledger

Guide Site upgrades Connect Stripe to Xero: card payments and fees, sorted Customers pay your Xero invoices by card, Xero records the Stripe fee, and website sales reconcile through the Stripe bank feed. Both set up, step by step. October 23, 2026 4 min read

Shopify and Xero logos joined by an arrow labelled sales, fees, payouts and GST, over a photo of a shopping bag and a notebook

Guide Site upgrades Connect Shopify to Xero: your options, step by step Shopify and Xero connected, with payouts and GST that match your bank. Start with Xero's free app, or use A2X, Link My Books or a custom sync when you outgrow it. October 22, 2026 5 min read

A fingertip tapping a big yellow Buy button on a touchscreen laptop, next to tiny menu links at the top of the page

Dev log Accessibility Touchscreen Macs are coming: make your site easy to tap Make every button, link and menu at least 44 px to tap, leave space between them, and never hide menus or details behind hover. Here's the CSS to do it. October 21, 2026 12 min read

A huge gold picture frame stuck in a narrow front door, with a small yellow parcel waiting on the doorstep

Dev log Performance Faster images, faster site: every trick, with examples Resize your images, save them as WebP or AVIF, lazy-load everything below the first screen, and let a CDN and caching deliver them. Here's how to do each one. October 18, 2026 10 min read

A key ring with a brass key, a yellow tag showing a six-digit code and a dark fob with a fingerprint, hanging on a grey wall

Lesson Guides SFA, 2FA, MFA and passkeys: safer logins in plain English Turn on two-factor authentication everywhere, use passkeys where you can, keep your recovery codes safe, and let a password manager remember the rest. October 18, 2026 13 min read