A good 404

A good 404

Those whose fingers get into a tangle will be familiar with the HTML 404 error code page, just one of a number of HHTP status codes, of which the 400 series deals with client errors.

A moment’s digital dyslexia this morning meant your ‘umble scribe was treated to Shropshire Council‘s 404 error page, as shown below.

Shropshire's Council 404 page

Umbraco is the open source content management system (CMS) used by the council to manage its website.

Your correspondent particularly likes the final line: “This page is intentionally left ugly ;-)”.

Computer scientist Brett Victor has an artistic 404 page, which pays homage to surrealist artist René Magritte.

404 page of a pipe reading this is not a page

However, my favourite 404 page of all time assumes the persona of Marvin the Paranoid Android from Douglas Adams’ Hithchiker’s Guide to the Galaxy and can be seen here in all its glory.

Author: Steve Woods

Generic carbon-based humanoid life form.