Web Explained
A mailto link opens a draft; it does not send the message for you
Clicking an email address on a website can open a mail application with the recipient already filled in. This is commonly done with a mailto link. The…
Everyday technology, a little clearer
Web Explained
Plain-language explanations for the web’s less obvious behaviour.
Web Explained
A 204 response can mean the save worked even though no page came back
An empty response is not always a failed request. HTTP status 204 means the server successfully handled the request and has no response content to return.…
Web Explained
The hash at the end of a link often points inside the page
A link ending in #ingredients may be trying to take you to a section of a page. The portion after the hash is called a fragment. Understanding it helps…
Web Explained
Checkboxes and radio buttons ask different kinds of questions
A form with several small controls may look straightforward, but the control type can change what an answer means. Checkboxes commonly allow independent…
Web Explained
A 206 Response Can Be a Successful Request for Part of a File
Partial Content sounds like a download has gone wrong, but HTTP status 206 can mean the server successfully supplied the specific portion the client…
Web Explained
A Responsive Picture Can Use a Different Image on a Narrow Screen
A photograph on a phone may show a tighter composition than the version on a desktop page. A website can deliberately offer different image sources instead…
Web Explained
Accept-Language Is a Preference Signal, Not Proof of Where Someone Lives
A website can receive language preferences from a browser, but those preferences do not establish the visitor’s nationality or location. Understanding the…
Web Explained
Content-Encoding Describes a Transformation Applied to the Response
A response can carry HTML while also declaring gzip or another content encoding. Those labels describe different layers: what the content is and how it has…