Use a standard static site generator and overhaul site

[sbruder]

Goal

The site should look clean and simple. It should explain what the Summer of Nix program is about and present the sponsors. Announcements and Blog posts should be easily accessible from the main page. Adding a blog post should be easily doable in a PR to this repository.

Current problems

• Adding a blog article requires adding/editing nix files
• No real support for dates (for announcements etc.)
• No Nix syntax highlighting
• All pages use front page layout (huge hero)
• Inconsistent spacing
• No dates in blog posts
• No navigation bar with list of all pages

Proposed Solution

As part of making it more accessible, we should move from our self-implemented Nix SSG to are more standard one. Some are

• Jekyll (very well known)
• Hugo (also popular)
• Zola (less popular but simpler)
• Styx (uses Nix, but unmaintained)
• Astro (not in nixpkgs)
• Coricamu (uses Nix)

Required features

• Ease of use (adding a blog post should be adding a markdown file with a simple structure)
• Syntax highlighting (with support for Nix!)
• Simplicity (it is a simple site and probably does not even need JavaScript)
• In nixpkgs or easily packageable
• Futureproof to reduce maintenance work on the site in the future
• One markdown file for each article including metadata
• Easy to add dates
• Custom components
• Flexible and easy styling
• RSS and iCal feeds

Things to do

• Create a robust technical base for the site
  • Main page: Description of the program, most recent announcements, Sponsors, Link to this repository (showcasing it is built with Nix)
  • Header/Navbar: Links to Blog posts, Videos, (Announcements?)
  • Blog posts: List of blog posts with title, date, (author?) and a short description (or the full article?)
  • Videos: Links/Embeds to YouTube
• Implement/Adapt a matching design for the website (how much should we adhere to the NixOS common styles?)

[nrdsp]

Maybe also worth considering Styx, since it's written in Nix. Documentation here.

[sbruder]

That looks interesting. It doesn’t seem to be maintained anymore though, so I don’t know if using it will be viable long-term.

[sbruder]

As a proof-of-concept I ported the current content to Zola: https://github.com/sbruder/nixos-summer/tree/zola It is only a skeleton and missing pretty much everything except for the content.

I will now work on some of the technical features, but will need some support for the design part.