Static Text Generation -

Static text generated web sites, like this one, are relatively new but exhibit a model for an understanding of change that should be studied.

Standardization

As I develop this site, first in Docpad then in Hugo, I can see an abstraction of text change.

All the content is contained in the content/
All content is written in a declarative text markup language such as Markdown and is then transpiled into HTML for presentation.
What if we could write content in one static generation framework and reliably transfer it to any other that complied with a standard?
Everything in the Content folder should be portable from one Static Gen framework to another.
Markdown gives us some idea of what such a standard looks like in the way it abstracts out the general formatting features that a text document would be written in.

Choosing Hugo Over DocPad

Standardized Markdown provides portability.

March 1, 1033
tech
stack
standards

I love the flexibility of static generated sites. I can create content easily while I also develop the logical structure of the components and their taxonomical relations. Most of that is provided by Markdown, including the YAML front-matter. So the static generator just needs to be easy to start and extend, and it also needs to be sustainable. It doesn’t make sense to invest in learning how to use a static site generator that is not being actively used by a community of people.

Developing in Docpad

The centrality of human-readable text

February 19, 19022

I’ve started developing in Docpad because I love lo-fi text-only documentation. This CMS uses folder structure and tags for site hierarchy and is very flexible. The MarkDown is transpiled into html and I can use a variety of templating languages for the layout components. I’m going under the assumption that this will all provide maximal flexibility while I am actively creating content. Lo-fi Conceptual Representations I write a lot of notes every single day in MarkDown and yaml.