Starting anew
It had been a long while (more than 2 years, actually) since this website got any noteworthy update. Both its content and code were starting to be severely outdated. A good time to rebuild it, from scratch and in the open.
A place to share
The more we share, the better. I learnt so much reading tech articles online from people sharing how they built things, small and large. There will be plenty going on with the rebuilding of the site, so I might as well give some knowledge back, mistakes and wanderings included. And plenty going on after the site is build, new things to build, new experiments made, which I hope to carry on sharing.
Down with the old
I'm planning major changes for this new version, so it made more sense to start from scratch. Besides refocusing the content on web technologies, it will:
- have content in both French and English: The web is full of English written tech content. For all the people it reaches, it leaves on the side people that don't speak it. Providing translation of the content means even more people can access it.
- use a static site generator: The content is pretty static after all and it's been something I had been wanting to play with for a bit. I'm quite excited to see how far those things can go and code multilingual functionalities for them. And that means no Wordpress admin to hack on the website anymore.
- dive deeper into the IndieWeb: it feels more and more important to keep tending to a little corner of the internet. This ensures content doesn't risk disappearing because a 3rd party publishing platform decided to close, censor or change their algorithm. Not to mention the pleasure to grow that little space.
- a new design: this black on white minimal design is only temporary. I'm looking forward to get back to something colorful and with a bit of texture. But that'll come after the static site generator is set up.
What about the old content? It'll remain accessible at old.romaricpascal.is, trying to not break links too much with the 4042302 technique proposed by Aral Balkan.
So where to now?
This journey start with lots of excitement, the head full of ideas of what to make from that blank state. With the aim to share the rebuilding of the site, I need to get some HTML out as fast as possible.
This means starting with the static site generator and quickly getting in the minimal features to produce, for each language:
- a homepage
- a listing of articles
- a RSS feed of the articles
- the articles themselves
I'll take a few shortcuts along the way, planning a little tidy up after I start publishing (famous last words). As you're reading these lines, this should be underway or even completed.
From there, I'll give a little more thoughts on the content I want besides a journal of the site rebuild, design suitable pages to hold it and implement that design. At least that's the plan :)
If that sounds interesting, grab the RSS feed or just come back on the site every now and then.