Jekyll

Jekyll reads Markdown and templates and writes a directory of HTML. That sentence is the whole product, the whole security model, and most of the maintenance plan.

Why we still choose it

Because the alternative — a content management system on a public IP address, executing plugin code, talking to a database — is a program you are running for no reason when every visitor sees the same page. Removing the runtime removes the patch cadence, the admin login, the database, and the entire category of incident that follows from having them.

It is also fifteen years old and still builds the same way, which is a feature. Several generations of static generators have been announced and abandoned in that window.

How we run it

Content in Markdown in your Git repository, reviewed in pull requests. A Git-backed editor for colleagues who do not use a terminal. A build in your own CI that checks links and enforces a performance budget, producing a directory that nginx serves from Stockholm or Falkenstein. No third-party scripts, no cookie banner, no tracker to disclose.

The honest limit

Per-user state, checkout flows and content that changes by the minute are all the wrong shape for static generation. Roughly a third of the time the honest answer to “should this be Jekyll?” is no, and we would rather say that in the first meeting than the fourth month.

This site is built with it.