alexwlchan - Using static websites for tiny archives

Alex writes about creating HTML files in folders to browse files in various ways.

This allowed me to radically simplify the folder structure, and stop chasing the perfect hierarchy. In these mini-websites, I use very basic folders – files are either grouped by year or by first letter of their filename. I only look at the folders when I’m adding new files, and never for browsing. When I’m looking for files, I always use the website. The website can use keyword tags to let me find files in multiple ways, and abstract away the details of the underlying folders.

Why HTML?

I’m deliberately going low-scale, low-tech. There’s no web server, no build system, no dependencies, and no JavaScript frameworks. I’m writing everything by hand, which is very manageable for small projects. Each website is a few hundred lines of code at most.

It reminded me of a time when I had to present a project I'd worked on as part of a job interview. I created a number of linked HTML files that walked through various parts of the code. It had the benefit that if a question was asked I could directly open up the relevant file and dive into the code. The interviewers didn't seem impressed but I ended up getting the job, so I guess it worked.