I'm just surprised we haven't seem some app that can act like a wordpress admin page but generating a static output you can host for free or very cheap somewhere.
I'm just surprised there is nothing that fills the gap between github pages and a full hosted solution with a ton of junk you don't need. All it really needs is maybe a locally running app that can handle generating the static pages and uploading them for you.
It's a lot.
It really feels like the only part of a non-static site most want is an editor. I absolutely loathe the matter but I do see why some restaurants only maintain a facebook page for their online presence.
Netlify does way more than this, but it makes hosting static stuff super easy.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44391535
(I'm not affiliated with it)
I set it up for my brother to run his static blog, and it's quite good if you like that kind of thing. There are some quirks where it gets confused if you rename mycoolarticle.md, so I still prefer using notepad++ and git and CLI for mine.
Two examples I've briefly worked with:
Decap CMS (formerly Netlify CMS): https://decapcms.org/
Lume CMS: https://lume.land/cms/
For non-technical people I'd recommend the Hostinger Website Builder, Obsidian Quartz or Astro Starlight.
Although as a front-end dev I'd choose building a custom page with Astro, which has now become much easier though with good templates available + LLM assistance.
I wrote a comparison of less-technical ways to build a website here with more details: https://webdev.bryanhogan.com/start/ways-to-build/
NextJS + Git + Vercel.
haven't used it, but looks like a great idea!
Basically you'll be able to edit the markdown for your site in a souped up version of our lightly reskinned vscode IDE at https://brilliant.mplode.dev and instantly publish/preview the changes in the same browser tab in a pane. Brilliant comes with a full Linux environment running in a container on our cloud platform, and building a Statue static site is already a one-command operation. The little UI we're working on let's nontechnical people skip that and just edit files and click buttons to make changes and publish it, though.
Here's a one-liner that will get you an entire static site with content (not the landing page yet, though) you can edit via markdown:
yes | npx sv create . --template minimal --types ts --no-add-ons --install npm && npm install statue-ssg && npx statue init && npm install && npm run dev
The only benefit I can think of is if it leads to more frequent updates by the restaurant, due to limited skillset.
The trade-off is that they'll have to pinch/zoom if they have a small display. It's a minor inconvenience to make the exact information they want available instantly.
It's not even about blind people. People with ADHD or dyslexia use assistive technology, which frequently makes an absolute horlicks of interpreting PDF. It's one of the reasons I'm trying to move a lot of documentation at work away from PDF and onto just straight HTML.
Plain old HTML, with thin CSS on it to make it not be black-and-white Times New Roman. Kicking it oldschool.
Wait for 2 more iOS redesigns and everyone will use assistive technology on Apple devices :)
- https://astro.build/themes/details/astropie/
- https://astro.build/themes/details/astrorante/
- https://astro.build/themes/details/tastyyy-restaurant-websit...
Netlify is a great company that I'll always support.
Making a website's basic functionality work without JS isn't just for the random users who switch off their browser's JS runtime.
It's also for the people who have a random network dropout or slowdown on a random file (in this case a JS file).
In my area most restaurants have no website.
If they have a website it's often very hard to find their opening hours. Under 'contact'? Nope! At the footer? Nay! Maybe somewhere hidden in the menu PDF? With luck... Outside their homepage at google maps? Maybe. On their Tripadvisor page? Hahaha! Funny! Not.
Actually, nobody should need an XML parser to see the soups either.
/s
[0] https://mxtoolbox.com/SuperTool.aspx?action=a%3alocalcafe.or...
I used elixir because thats what I know and love so it was mostly just a personal choice rather than a technical one.
First, the site generator is MIT licensed but I don't see a link to the license. If someone forks this generator, would they be in compliance with MIT license requirements?
Second, the images linked in this site are quite nice. I can imagine someone choosing to use some of them as is. Are they yours to share?
Third, it appears that you are targeting non-developers. I would think about how to make it as easy as possible to customize. Decisions like putting images in "priv/output/images" seems a bit confusing.
Second: pixabay
Third: Yeah that's the challenge I'm working on at the moment. Thanks for the feed back.
I do plan on cleaning up the repo so that you are not starting with the example and also plan on making a small tutorial video to show how much effort it takes to setup.
We assume people are so stupid, its not they are stupid, they have to learn wordpress admin, square space's admin, wixx, they all have a learning curve. The issue is time and effort. If the process is simple even if not elegant its still simple.
In my case you are logging into github and navigating to a folder vs an admin and navigating to a specific section. Editing file directly in github vs hitting save on some form and site deploys via github actions without any other need. If anything my system offers version control baked in with about the same level of effort.
