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Jamstacked Issue 19

A comprehensive overview of your SSG options

Published: Nov 26, 2020

Your update on all things Jamstack

#19 — November 26, 2020
✦ web version

The first decision a new Jamstack developer tends to want to make is what static site generator to use. This isn't an easy decision as there are a lot of options. We can break it down first to a list of popular and well-maintained options (which Bejamas cover in their excellent post this week), but that still leaves a lot of choices.

Here's the thought process I suggest. JavaScript or not? If not, go with Hugo, Jekyll or Bridgetown. JavaScript framework or not? If not, go with Eleventy. React? Use Next.js or Gatsby. Vue? Use Nuxt, Gridsome or VuePress. Angular? Use Scully. This brings you down to no more than three options to evaluate, which makes the decision-making much more reasonable. HTH.

— Brian Rinaldi

↘︎ What's Good

Beginner’s Guide to Static Site Generators
The title of this is a little misleading. While it does cover the high level basics, this is probably the most comprehensive overview of SSG options I have seen covering nine of the most popular options in detail.

Thom Krupa

Jamstack Explorers — Free Jamstack Courses
The Developer Experience team at Netlify has released this set of free Jamstack courses about Jamstack. Currently there are courses on Angular and the Jamstack, Next.js, and split-testing using Netlify.

Netlify

Announcing WPGraphQL v1.0
The folks at Gatsby have sponsored development of this WordPress plugin that can turn your WordPress site into a GraphQL server, making it easier to fetch lots of data or even to use it as a backend to your Jamstack frontend (i.e. Jamstack + Wordpress rather than Jamstack vs. Wordpress).

Jason Bahl

How to Debug Netlify Serverless Lambda Functions using VS Code for your JAMstack App
Serverless functions are a critical piece to adding dynamic functionality to any Jamstack application. Netlify Functions makes them easy to deploy by including them in your main project code, but debugging can still be difficult. This is a good guide to getting set up.

Tapas Adhikary

✂︎ Tools and Resources

  • TheJam.dev 2021 - I just announced this two-day virtual conference coming January 28-29. Speakers list is live and tickets are on sale.
  • JAMStack tools - A new site that aims to help you find Jamstack related tools and services. If you have a tool, you can register to add it to the list for free.
  • Suri - A URL shortener that can be easily deployed as a static site to Netlify or Vercel.
  • ▶ JAMstack Radio Ep. #67 with Colby Fayock - Discussing their favorite JAMstack tools, as well as decoupling frontend and backend services.
  • ▶ Smashing Podcast Ep. 29 With Leslie Cohn-Wein - Talking to Netlify Staff Engineer Leslie Cohn-Wein about dogfooding Jamstack at Netlify and more.

❖ Tidbits

Announcing Gatsby’s New File System Route API
This seems to make routing in Gatsby function more like Next.js without requiring configuration in a a gatsby-node.js.

Lennart Jörgens

Building a Podcast Site using Gatsby, React, Netlify, & Amazon S3
A guide to walk you through building a podcast site using Gatsby deployed to Netlify with S3 hosting the audio files that uses a custom media player.

Vincent Tang

What is Static Site Generation? How Next.js Uses SSG for Dynamic Web Apps
A good walkthrough on the differences between SSR and static generation and the basics of building a statically rendered site using Next.js.

Colby Fayock

Building an Eleventy Boilerplate, Part 1
A good series that goes into a lot of detail about creating sites in Eleventy. You can find part two here.

Brent Ritchie

As always, I welcome feedback or link suggestions via Twitter. Stay safe and healthy! — Brian