Developer Notes Archives - Page 2 of 4

SEO: Search Engine Optimization

If you just launched a WordPress site — or inherited one that’s never been properly configured for search — this guide walks through every step needed to get Google to find it, understand it, and rank it fairly. It’s written as a checklist you can work through top to bottom, but each item includes the *why*, the *how*, and the mistakes that trip people up.

This is the general-purpose version of the playbook. It assumes a WordPress site with Yoast SEO installed, but the underlying principles (canonical URLs, verified ownership, a clean sitemap, and healthy Core Web Vitals) apply to any CMS on any host.

July 14, 2026 No Comments

How to Mount an External Hard Drive on Linux

On Windows, plugging in a drive gives it a letter like E:\ automatically. Linux doesn’t — it makes you mount the drive, which just means: attach the drive’s contents to a folder on your filesystem.

Picture your Linux filesystem as one big tree starting at /. An unmounted drive is a box sitting on the floor, not connected to anything. Mounting grafts that box’s contents onto a folder — a mount point — so that opening the folder means you’re looking inside the drive.

July 11, 2026 No Comments

Security as Part of the Development Process

The Big Picture: What Just Launched? A new Encrypted Credential Vault has been successfully pushed to the project. Think of this like a mini-1Password or Bitwarden built right into the app. When you view an asset, you can now securely attach passwords, API keys, or private notes to it. Before this code went live, the latest updates from other teammates (the Friends feature, security docs, and styling tweaks) were safely pulled in and combined with it. Zero-Knowledge Security: How It Keeps Data Safe The core philosophy here is “Zero-Knowledge.” The server (and anyone running the database) has absolutely no idea what your passwords are. Here is exactly how that works in plain English: The Golden Rule: Because the server never stores your passphrase, there is no “Forgot Password” button. If you lose your master passphrase, the data is permanently lost. Building a Digital Vault: How We Engineered Security into MyDigitally.app

July 11, 2026 No Comments

Why MyCalendone (Circal)?

The “Why” — What is the real problem? Most people plan their day without any awareness of how their body will actually feel at the time they’ve scheduled something. A meeting booked for 2pm on a Tuesday sounds neutral on paper, but if your circadian rhythm produces a deep post-lunch trough at that hour, you will show up for it distracted and underperforming — and you will have no idea that moving it to 10am would have made it twice as productive. The data to predict this already exists. It is sitting in your sleep log, your meals, your stress levels, and your own historical snapshots of how you felt at specific times of day. The problem is that nothing puts this data onto your calendar so you can see it alongside your schedule. There are three distinct pain points this app addresses: 1. “I don’t know when

June 29, 2026 No Comments

Name Change from MyCalendone to Circal

The Dev Name Problem Most products start with a working title — something functional, descriptive, and unmemorable. Ours was MyCalendone. “MyCalendone” = “My Calendar” + “Done” It was never a brand; it was a placeholder. The problem is that placeholders have a way of sticking around past their welcome, showing up in browser tabs, OAuth consent screens, and app stores long after you needed them to. The moment you decide to show something to real users, the name stops being internal shorthand and starts being the first impression. What We Were Actually Naming Before picking a name, we had to be honest about what the product does — and what it does not do. Circal overlays your personal energy forecast on Google Calendar. It uses sleep, meals, mood, and circadian science to predict which hours of your day will be sharp and which will be foggy. That is it.

June 29, 2026 No Comments

From Web to iOS: Rediscovering Mobile Development After Years Away

Can an Old Developer Learn New Tricks? Rediscovering Mobile Development for 2026 Can an experienced developer still learn new tricks? That’s the question I found myself asking as I looked at the shifting digital landscape and decided it was time to dive back into the mobile world—this time with a modern, security-first mindset. After years focused on web development and building secure full-stack applications, I am stepping out of the comfort zone of a single stack to embrace continuous learning as a core survival strategy. The spark for this transition came directly from real-world market demands. Clients don’t just want responsive web platforms; they want true native mobile experiences that deliver seamless performance, intuitive workflows, and ironclad data privacy. In an industry where paradigms shift overnight, the willingness to adapt determines who thrives and who gets left behind. Rebuilding the Archives: Three Ecosystems, One Goal This year, in 2026, I

June 27, 2026 No Comments

Category: Developer Notes