2025/06/16
Alright, I'm going to write this in the middle of creating the blog page to compliment the "Sample Blog Post" for testing purposes...
I decided to make my own website. I had one a long time ago, I don't really remember anything about it. I've been thinking about having one for quite a while for numerous reasons. Recently I brought up the idea to a new friend I met online in FFXIV and they said "Why not?" That wasn't quite enough for me, but over the next few days I ran into more encouragement from various sources. First was a technical youtuber who said something to the tune of "Like any self respecting hobby developer ... my website". Later, I stumbled across You've Got Kat on YouTube through their video about the "indie-web" and that was the end of it.
As a passionate learner, I did the most sensible thing to me and just got started with a blank .html file. I quickly discovered that the web has grown quite a bit since I last interacted with it on this level, and that I'd have to run a local webserver before I could really start. So I got node installed and figured out the absolute basics to be able to launch an http server and started writing. Anyone interested in building their own website today would be wise to pick a HTML Generator/Framework such as Astro before starting. I, however, have decided to write everything completely from scratch.
Those who understand what I just said might be asking themselves "Whytho?" I will tell you. I first started writing code when I was 10 using the BlitzBasic game engine. I didn't really understand what I was doing. In high school a friend introduced me to Python, and I started tinkering with it, still not really understanding what I was doing. Over the years of tinkering, I have grown and now generally understand, at least on a basic level, what it is that I am doing. I took a couple of CS courses in University where I was forced into learning C++, which was the first time I really deviated from Python. The experience of writing and compiling code in C++ showed me that there was a lot that I still did not understand about what it is that I was really doing. I realized in that moment, that understanding the fundamentals of a concept before diving into the deep end has a lot of benefits. In summary: I believe that if I build this completely from scratch by myself, I will garner a deeper understanding of the fundamentals, and when I eventually do pick up a framework and rebuild my work in it I will be better equipped to leverage the tool, and have a deeper appreciation for the tool.
So, that's right, this website is written completely from scratch. I intend to use all of the core technologies of web development along the way: HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. I've already learned to dislike JavaScript. I have used TypeScript in my professional life in the past, and being forced into writing JavaScript has reminded me of all the reasons why I just jumped right over to TypeScript in the first place. The HTML Generator/Web Framework I linked earlier (Astro) is somehow capable of accepting TypeScript and generating web content with it. One day I will surely be profoundly relieved when I start using such a tool. In the meantime, I am here, writing everything manually. Page by page.
Wellp, hopefully that's enough content to get a feel for how my page is looking, so that's all for now.