1.8 Creating a web page and blog, the Texinfo way.
==================================================

2023-08-10

    A website's materials aren't HTML tags, CSS, or JavaScript code.
    Rather, they are its content and the context in which it's
    consumed.  A website is for a visitor, using a browser, running on
    a computer to read, watch, listen, or perhaps to interact.  A
    website that embraces Brutalist Web Design is raw in its focus on
    content, and prioritization of the website visitor.

            -- _Guidelines for Brutalist Web Design (1)_

  We all know that personal web pages and blogs have lost popularity.
I've now solved the main reason behind it: no easy way to do it using
Texinfo (2).

1.8.1 What is it
----------------

‘texiblog’ is the result of my journey trying to find a simple solution
for restarting a personal website, with updated articles - so, a website
that is also a 'blog'.  There is no lack of solutions out there, from
Wordpress to static site generators, but I didn't found one that
completely satisfied me.

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The result viewed in ‘lynx’: completely usable.

  *note I describe it more thoroughly in the Project section:
Texiblog.:

    ‘texiblog’ is my home-grown solution for building a static site,
    and is what is behind my personal website.  It uses ‘texi2any’ to
    create the HTML from Texinfo files, adds some styling options,
    creates updated menus from the posts (to provide an easy way to
    check recent articles), and uses ‘m4’ throughout as a pre-processor
    and as a way to create the Atom and RSS XML files, as well as other
    niceties.

  So, there you have it: a Texinfo website, with some minimal styling
meant to keep the inherent simplicity of the approach, that uses ‘m4’
for most of the things that aren't directly done by ‘texi2any’ (included
in Texinfo).  It outputs HTML, ready to deploy anywhere, but can also
create a ‘info’ file, or a PDF, or everything in a single text file.

  The code is available at the ‘texiblog’ Notabug repository (3).

1.8.2 What's Brutalist about it?
--------------------------------

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Het Poplakov Cafe (Dnipropetrovsk), Ukraine.  A popular example of
Soviet brutalism with a space-travel twist.

Very little and, amazingly, also a lot, depending on how you look at it.

  The topic of how Brutalism applies to web design has seen some
interesting discussions in recent years, also tied with the increased
appreciation for the architectural style.  There are two main
approaches, which are also largely incompatible:

“Brutalism as a retro-aesthetic”

    This is the most visible one, and also the one that is noticeable
    more purposeful: websites apply complex designs that make them look
    'raw', often using a colour palette and fonts reminiscent of the
    ones used in the 70s-80s.  The focus is more a recreation of the
    aesthetics around Brutalist architecture, including things that
    were not part of it but that were used at the same time.

    The gallery at Brutalist Websites (4) shows many such sites.

“Brutalism as adherence to the original principles”

    This is less concerned with recreating a particular aesthetics,
    even though it ends up having one due to the application of the
    identified principles - one that often recreates early web pages,
    with minimal or no CSS at all and raw HTML elements used in their
    default forms.  This applies Brutalism to web design by stressing
    _content_ as the raw material, and everything else should revolve
    around it.

    David Copeland's 'Guidelines for Brutalist Web Design' (5) is a
    great example of this.

  By using Texinfo, and the output produced by ‘texi2any’, there's by
default a 'rawness' of the latter kind, given the little to no styling
done by default.  The additional styling I did (maximum width, side
images in large screens) was made in a way that keeps the focus on the
principles identified there.  This was not done initially on purpose: I
found 'Brutalist web design' while searching around for minimal styling
suggestions that kept content at the centre stage, and the main concepts
behind it are already well-served by the default ouput.

1.8.3 Why a personal site at all these days?
--------------------------------------------

Having a personal website was the norm when the World Wide Web exploded
in the 90s: not necessarily a domain, but having a 'tilde' webpage
somewhere was part of using the web (6).

  While there were always attempts at building 'walled gardens' (AOL
was one of the biggest, and in Portugal I still remember that there was
an attempt of making 'The Microsoft Network' another one), what ended up
leading to the decrease in personal websites was the growth in social
networks, which made keeping a personal page less of a requirement: the
'webpage' became the 'profile page', often split in many different
networks.

  This was, at least, what happened to my online presence in the last
decade or so: instead of writing in my page, I started to write in
LinkedIn, or in Twitter, or using GitHub.

  I feel we are at a juncture where increased atomisation is fueled by
social networks, which are themselves fracturing and making it obvious
that there are real risks in making them our main internet presence.
This page is my attempt at reclaiming this presence, and by doing so
going back to some of the core principles of the world wide web.

  ---------- Footnotes ----------

  (1) Guidelines for Brutalist Web Design
(https://brutalist-web.design/)

  (2) Texinfo (https://www.gnu.org/software/texinfo/)

  (3) ‘texiblog’ Notabug repository (https://notabug.org/fsm/texiblog)

  (4) Brutalist Websites (https://brutalistwebsites.com/)

  (5) David Copeland's 'Guidelines for Brutalist Web Design'
(https://brutalist-web.design/)

  (6) Cameron's World (7) captures the richeness of this time, when
personal web pages were connected by 'web rings' and each page had a
certain _kitsch_ honesty to them, underneath all the animated images

  (7) Cameron's World (https://www.cameronsworld.net/)

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