Static site generator

Short description: System in web publishing

Static site generators (SSGs) are engines that use text input files (such as Markdown, reStructuredText, AsciiDoc and JSON) to generate static web pages.[1] Static sites generated by static site generators do not require a backend after site generation, making them first-class citizens on content delivery networks (CDNs). Some of the most popular static site generators are Jekyll, Hugo, Next.js (JavaScript).[2][3] SSGs are typically for rarely-changing, informative content, such as product pages, news websites, (software) documentation, manuals, and blogs.

## Contents

* 1 Architecture
* 2 Examples
* 3 Comparison with server-side systems
* 4 References
* 5 External links

## Architecture

SSGs typically consist of a template written in HTML with a templating system, such as liquid (Jekyll) or Go template (Hugo). The same structure (typically a Git repository) includes content in a plain-text format such as Markdown or reStructuredText, or in a structural meta format such as JSON or XML. A single plain-text file may correspond to a single web page while a single structural meta file may result in a whole Website through a SPA framework like Angular. The website variable settings are stored in a flat-text configuration file `_config.yml` (YAML), `_config.toml` (TOML) or `_config.json` (JSON). Page files typically also start with a YAML, TOML or JSON preamble to define variables such as title, permalink, date, etc. Files with names that begin with an underscore (`_`) such as `_index.md` (as opposed to `index.md`) are considered templates or archetypes and are thus not rendered as pages themselves.

## Examples

Several hundreds SSGs have been documented to exist, with the vast majority being written in languages that are already prominent on the web, such as Python, Go, JavaScript and TypeScript.[4]

System label/name  | Language  | Notes

|
|

Jekyll | Ruby | Uses Liquid templating language.[4]
Hugo | Go | Uses Go templates and its main selling point is its high speed when compiling.[4]
Next.js | JavaScript | Uses React templates.[4]
Pelican  | Python  | Uses Jinja2 templates.[4] Compiles HTML from reStructuredText or Markdown.
Astro  | JavaScript | Uses the .astro syntax language by default (familiar to HTML or JSX). Supports multiple frameworks: Svelte, React, Preact, Vue, SolidJS, Lit, AlpineJS. Compiles HTML from Markdown or MDX.[4]

## Comparison with server-side systems

Server-side template system

Many server-side template systems have an option to publish output pages on the server, where the published pages are static. This is common on content management systems, like Vignette, but is not considered out-server generation. In the majority of cases, this "publish option" doesn't interfere with the template system, and it can be made by external software, as Wget.[5]

People began to use server-side dynamic pages generated from templates with pre-existent software adapted for this task. This early software was the preprocessors and macro languages, adapted for the web use, running on CGI. Next, a simple but relevant technology was the direct execution made on extension modules, started with SSI.

## References

1. ↑ "What is a Static Site Generator? How do I find the best one to use?" (in en). https://www.netlify.com/blog/2020/04/14/what-is-a-static-site-generator-and-3-ways-to-find-the-best-one/.
2. ↑ "What Is a Static Site Generator, and How Can It Help Your Website Creation Process?" (in en). 2021-12-15. https://teleporthq.io/blog/what-is-a-static-site-generator/.
3. ↑ CloudFlare (2022-09-18). "What is a static site generator?". https://www.cloudflare.com/learning/performance/static-site-generator/.
4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 4.5 "Static Site Generators - Top Open Source SSGs | Jamstack" (in en). https://jamstack.org/generators/.
5. ↑ "Static Site Generator" (in en). https://www.gatsbyjs.com/docs/glossary/static-site-generator/.

## External links

* JavaScript template libraries comparison from 2009
* Enforcing Strict Model–View Separation in Template Engines

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