Post-Monolithic Content Management

Jessica Parsons

slides.com/verythorough/post-monolithic-cms/live

About me

How I Got Here

My first Site

• static HTML & CSS uploaded via FTP
• learned with books and 'view source'
• no templating
• content written in HTML

sites for schools

• Lots of content
• Frequent updates
• Many editors

The monolithic CMS

visitor arrives → query DB to build page

Hosted CMS

as a service

• Company handles hosting & updates
• Developer has limited templating control
• No third-party plugins/extensions
• Editors use CMS UI to add/edit content

LightCMS, WordPress.com

"Self-Hosted"

CMS

• Developer finds own hosting, does own updates
• Developer has significant templating and function control
• Third-party plugins and extensions
• Editors still use CMS UI to add/edit content

WordPress.org, Drupal

Static Site Generators

Replacing a Piece of the Puzzle

writer edits → CMS writes to DB

visitor arrives → query DB to build page

Static Site Generators

Jekyll, Hugo, Gatsby, and more

• Free, high-quality hosting
• No software updates required
• Content must be written in code
   
• Developer has templating, but limited functionality without server-side code

API Alternatives

or one of Netlify's many open-source APIs

a small handful of examples:

WhY I loved THIS

• My creativity thrives on restriction
• Perfect for my emerging interests:
  • teaching new developers
  • civic tech volunteering

WhY I didn't

Ease of use

I wasn't alone

Prose.io

• open source
• simple wrapper for GitHub
• cool, but not quite there

I wasn't alone

• other Git-based
• some API-driven
• some tie to services like Google Docs
• some proprietary
• one even builds WordPress sites to static
  (more of a static site generator for a CMS!)

Kind of like Prose...

• open source
• Git-based

except with...

• refined UI with markdown preview
• built with React - custom UI widget components
• editorial workflow
• can log in without a GitHub account

Fancy Features

Diving In

Unexpected Queries

• Can it show two different posts types on a single page?
• Does it support multi-lingual sites?
• How does it handle site search?

This isn't a Content Management System at all.

It's an editing tool.

Advantages

• low upkeep, high "neglectability"
• low cost with high scalability
• modularity
• leverage specialization

But also some challenges...

Thanks!

slides.com/verythorough/post-monolithic-cms

@verythorough