Eleventy
Tool, static site, by 11ty
Assessment
The generator this site is built with. Its data cascade fits a site of structured entries better than the alternatives: a folder is a collection, a file is a record, and a filter in one place reshapes every page. Pair it with Pagefind for search.
2026-10-09
Strengths
- Markdown with a front matter header per record, folders as collections, templates for the rest
- Builds anywhere Node runs; the server only ever sees HTML
- A data cascade that makes a records site natural: directory data, computed fields, filters
Limitations
- Node and a node_modules folder, where Hugo is one binary
- Nunjucks templates are forgiving in ways that hide mistakes
Eleventy is a static site generator for Node: content files with YAML front matter, templates in any of several languages, and a data cascade that merges global data, directory data and per-file data before rendering.[1] It outputs plain HTML, so the result can be served by any web server with nothing installed.
Why it fits a records site
A site of entries is a database that happens to be files. In Eleventy each folder becomes a collection, each file's front matter is the record, computed data can derive fields, and filters written once in the configuration reshape every page.[2] A switch such as "public build drops home-only records" is a few lines in one file.
Things to know
- Dates in front matter become Date objects; normalise them in one place or sorting and display disagree.
- A
[1]-style citation in Markdown is a link reference to Markdown; use[^1]and transform it, or a plugin. - Keep
tagsfor collections and use another name for topical tags on a record; Eleventy mergestagsarrays. - Search is not built in; Pagefind indexes the output after the build.
History
- 2026-10-09: article written and published.
- 2026-10-09: entry created.
Comments
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