Some weeks ago, I was so privileged to have been invited to chat about myself and my blog at Manu's new series, People and Blogs. I really enjoyed following someone else's prompts. I never rationalised some decisions about this blog out loud, so it was a fascinating exercise.

Since then, I've been thinking about how I need to bring my bookmarks back, how my voice and thoughts matter to me and how I need to branch off and read more from people who don't work in tech.

I've been trying hard for the last few months to find a balance between work, my mental health, quality family time and returning to the tech community after maternity leave, but I haven't made much space to write here.

On a related note, Matthias Ott has a new newsletter called Own Your Web, and recently, Matthias asked, "If you have a personal website: how did it change your life?". I replied with: "@matthiasott oh! Things I've been invited to do were because of my website, especially articles and interviews. Also writing, quoting and linking to other people's work on my website has led me to actually meeting them in person later on in conferences which is lovely."

This reflection and my interview with Manu make me want to hug my blog.

Check the whole series because reading everyone else's interviews has given me so much joy!

With Twitter imploding and people (myself included) trying to move to multiple similar apps, I was following everyone I knew numerous times. It may not look like it, but I can be a bit shy! If we're "Twitter/conference friends", you probably noticed me clicking the follow button on at least three new platforms. Then, some social anxiety creeps in!

"Oh, I liked my friend's post on Mastodon. Should I also like and share it on the other platform they also shared it?"

"Oh no, this person only follows me back on this platform, but not on the other. Do they hate me?"

"Am I being annoying?"

"Where do I post this mediocre attempt at a joke?" (actually, the answer for that is your personal website.)

While I am content with Mastodon (I've had an account since 2017), I did sign up for Threads and BlueSky. I will probably sign up for whatever else comes along because, you know… FOMO. Turns out I had forgotten about our old friend LinkedIn, which is also where everyone is!

I initially created an account in 2012 and kept it until 2016 or 2017. At that point, I had amassed hundreds of connections. I was also a young woman, so a few previous male co-workers constantly crept on me, from frequently visiting my profile to even drunk messaging me (yes, on LinkedIn). At that time, I wasn't using my last name online and was keen to protect my privacy and location, so having a profile where anyone could see where I was for 8 hours a day did not make sense. It was a time of my life when I was going through lots of anxiety, so I deleted my account.

I just remembered about LinkedIn in mid-pandemic. I created a new account, added my current co-workers and some close friends and realised I only had 11 connections. I felt… a bit concerned about how it would make me look. The pandemic and life gave me lots more to worry about, so I forgot about LinkedIn again until a couple of weeks ago.

A friend messaged me, telling me something happened to them on LinkedIn, and I decided to log in. Turns out more people I know are on it (obviously!). More people to follow and add! And my number of connections is still tiny. What does that say about me? In 2023! Social media anxiety is back!

"Okay, so LinkedIn is, in theory, the professional side of social media. Am I being too much for adding this person I have only interacted with on Twitter?"

"This recommended person, I know them and have worked with them, but.. We haven't spoken in years. What should I do?!"

"I follow this person on four other social media platforms. Will I come across as overly keen if I click "follow here too??"

Anyway - I did click in a few! I even saw some posts from the State of the Browser that I was mentioned in.

But this got me thinking. Dang, what could have happened if creepy men weren't bothering me back in the day? Could I have kept connections with lovely people I have actually worked with in the past? Most aren't active on tech Twitter or these new platforms.

Because let's be realistic: before Twitter imploded, tech Twitter was/is very much only a Twitter thing. Most people I have ever worked with don't care about Twitter. And quite frankly, some of them were the best people I ever worked with. But they are all on LinkedIn. And I wasn't for years because I felt I had to get away to feel safe. How unfair. What opportunities could I have missed because of this?

There's a lot of crap on LinkedIn. It is its own meme, but something tells me that these new microblogging platforms will come and go, but LinkedIn will still be there with its own cursed vibe.

Anyway, if we have actually met, feel free to add me on LinkedIn!

Well, well, well. Who would have thought I would give this another go after pouring my heart a few years ago in a blog post? But I did! And nothing terrible happened!

I've had a silly idea of something I wanted to build for a long time, and I was daydreaming of turning it into a talk. While at Pixel Pioneers earlier in the summer, I asked Jeremy, Michelle and Andy for their opinion on my "elevator pitch", and they encouraged me to go for it. Later on, Hidde gave me excellent feedback on my written pitch. (Thank you!)

I applied around and was excited to have been invited to give it at the State of the Browser (which happened last month) and at FFConf (which is due to occur in less than a month). Another event is lined up for next year, but an official announcement still needs to be made.

My plan is to adapt the talk to each event. For the State of the Browser, I wanted to emphasize what you can do now with the browsers and their current ability. So, using vanilla javascript, HTML and CSS only. For future events, I'm hoping to expand on the tooling but also bring other aspects of fun and encouragement to build silly things for the sake of having fun.

I was incredibly nervous at the State of the Browser. It was my first talk in so many years, but the audience was incredible, and it was lovely to see so many familiar and friendly faces cheering me on. It went well. I even dared to watch the video! I now only hope that it gets even better each time.

I'm very nervous but looking forward to FFConf. It's literally the conference that started a journey of inspiration and acceptance in the tech community I chose to belong. I hope to contribute to people feeling as happy at the end of the day as I felt all these previous years as an attendee. And there are still tickets available!

I don't know where else I will give this talk - or if. But I will convert it to a blog post sometime next year. Regardless, I've updated my speaking page.

PS.: How cool is it that I could link a bunch of people here to their personal websites?

I need to preface this post by saying: bare with me. I was without doing much coding for over a year, so maybe I'm wrong, or everyone already knows this.

I recently had a situation where I needed to add a border between elements that sat in a 12 grid with a gap between them. To my knowledge (and again, possibly I am wrong), you can't add much on top of the grid-gap. I searched around but was in a rush, so I decided to do something that achieved the result visually. But it doesn't feel super nice and clean. In moments like this, I remind myself of what Rachel Andrew said at Pixel Pioneers some years ago: “Is this the right way to do it?... well, does it work?”.

It works. So here it is. You can fake a border effect by using two shadows, one on top of the other. The first declared shadow should match your background colour, while the second should be the desired border colour. The shadow with the same background colour will be on top of the shadow with the desired border colour. When this happens, there is a tiny difference in their offset. The shadow with the border colour will only be visible in that little offset gap.

The offset value should be half of the size of the gap, and the shadow that will act as the border should be a tiny bit bigger offset value.

See the Pen Experimenting with using box-shadow as a border on top of a grid gap by Ana Rodrigues (@ohhelloana) on CodePen.

In the codepen above I was somewhat successful at reproducing this visual effect with a few specific sizes. While the gap property accepts quite a few of them, the box-shadow property is more limited (I couldn't get this to work with percentages or calc() for example).

While the pixel option is the one that seems to work as expected in most browsers (desktop and mobile), it is also quite interesting how different lengths will generate visually different thicknesses of this fake border.

Update: Christopher Kirk-Nielsen very kindly forked my codepen and experimented with using custom properties and outlines.

Editing and manipulating someone isn't new. But now that it is more accessible than ever for anyone to do, it feels as if every day I could be risking my safety.

As someone who has been online for over 20 years, the majority of those as a child, teenager and young adult who didn't think much of consequences means that I have been trying to delete traces of myself from the internet for a couple of years. As a typical millennial, I went from extreme oversharing to extreme perusing of every privacy setting when I create an account anywhere.

In the early 2000s, someone could edit an image of me, for example, or as we say, "to Photoshop" me into anything. It could be done as a joke or malicious. It wasn't impossible but rare as most people didn't have the skills to do so. Nowadays, we can't say the same. Image manipulation apps are easy and free to get, as well as filters. With the so-called "deep fakes", your face could be posted on any body quickly and maliciously. The same with your voice.

Many years ago, I was having a conversation with a filmmaker who told me something that still haunts me: "I can't wait for it to be possible to use any dead actor in my films". The disregard for someone's image for profit and the lack of consent isn't new, but somehow tormenting when it is about someone who isn't alive anymore. I thought we were far from it, but it is already happening.

Almost every invention is eventually weaponised to hurt women.

I'm keen to return to being more active in the online community, particularly giving talks again. I'm now stressed about having videos of my face and voice online. It has put me off of doing some videos or even streaming. I've found examples of people who successfully stream without showing their faces or voice. Still, they have a lot more experience in setting up such things. Right now, I don't have the same skill or time. I recognise that perhaps I am overthinking and over-fearful of an unlikely scenario, but it does take one bad event.

I have thought, "While there isn't more protection, I will stay hidden and quiet, " but then the opportunities I want will also be taken away from me.

I don't have a solution. Just concerning thoughts.

• Deepfake porn documentary explores its 'life-shattering' impact
• Fake naked photos of thousands of women shared online