Building websites with lots of little HTML pages

#1

Post by Kerrick » Sun, Mar 09, 2025, 1:25 PM UTC

Building websites with lots of little HTML pages
blog.jim-nielsen.com

Re: Building websites with lots of little HTML pages

#2

Post by Terretta » Mon, Mar 10, 2025, 4:50 PM UTC

This is brilliant.

Instead of a single page app (SPA), you can almost picture the connections between all these little .html pages as some sort of web.

Re: Building websites with lots of little HTML pages

#3

Post by ilrwbwrkhv » Wed, Mar 12, 2025, 7:45 PM UTC

the web is so built for this. when you go to sites like this it just feels right. we could have had this as our future instead of the craziness of javascript and nextjs and react. now some new devs dont know html exist. they think react is the web.

Re: Building websites with lots of little HTML pages

#4

Post by jonwinstanley » Wed, Mar 12, 2025, 7:55 PM UTC

Interesting thoughts.

I’ve been using both Hotwire and HTMX recently.

The swapping in of different html is making a come back.

Re: Building websites with lots of little HTML pages

#5

Post by dredmorbius » Wed, Mar 12, 2025, 7:56 PM UTC

Terretta wrote: post #2

This is brilliant. Instead of a single page app (SPA), you can almost picture the connections between all these little .html pages as some sort of web.

One spanning the world, perhaps.

Even ... widely.

Re: Building websites with lots of little HTML pages

#6

Post by arnley » Wed, Mar 12, 2025, 7:56 PM UTC

Views transitions are very useful in content-first websites.

I've used them extensively when working on https://stack.lol

Try and navigate through pages, or change the language, and you'll get these neat effects "for free".

Frameworks like AstroJS also help a lot as they facilitate using view transitions.

Re: Building websites with lots of little HTML pages

#7

Post by dredmorbius » Wed, Mar 12, 2025, 7:58 PM UTC

What were the arguments in favour of SPAs in the first place?

I'm finding it interesting that most of the top HN submissions (by popularity) matching "single page app" are critical, not positive. First 15 follow, all but 5 are negative:

- You probably don't need a single-page app (https://journal.plausible.io/you-probably-dont-need-a-single...) 816 points | 6 years ago | 499 comments

- A single-page app is almost always worse than a multi-page app (https://www.gregnavis.com/articles/the-architecture-no-one-n...) 289 points | 6 years ago | 145 comments

- The myth that you can’t build interactive web apps except as single page app (https://htmx.org/essays/you-cant/) 262 points | 4 months ago | 143 comments

- Building a single-page app with Htmx (https://jakelazaroff.com/words/building-a-single-page-app-wi...) 252 points | 5 months ago | 143 comments

- AWS Lambda as a back end for a single-page app (http://lg.io/2015/05/16/the-future-is-now-and-its-using-aws-...) 229 points | 10 years ago | 73 comments

- Create your own dysfunctional single-page app (https://tinnedfruit.com/articles/create-your-own-dysfunction...) 208 points | 6 years ago | 138 comments

- The Single-Page-App Morality Play (https://www.baldurbjarnason.com/2021/single-page-app-moralit...) 207 points | 3 years ago | 131 comments

- Todos: a Backbone.js example Single-Page-App (with LocalStorage)(http://documentcloud.github.com/backbone/examples/todos/inde...) 169 points | 14 years ago | 28 comments

- Your single-page app is now a polyfill (https://itnext.io/your-single-page-app-is-now-a-polyfill-788...) 164 points | 4 years ago | 158 comments

- Why I hate your Single Page App (https://medium.freecodecamp.org/why-i-hate-your-single-page-...) 107 points | 8 years ago | 120 comments

- Building a single page app with Backbone.js, underscore.js and jQuery (http://andyet.net/blog/2010/oct/29/building-a-single-page-ap...) 103 points | 14 years ago | 19 comments

- Why I hate your Single Page App (2016)(https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/why-i-hate-your-single-pag...) 37 points | 11 months ago | 34 comments

- Sonny – Fast single page app engine (https://github.com/felixmaier/sonnyJS) 36 points | 10 years ago | 25 comments

- You probably don't need a single page app (https://plausible.io/blog/you-probably-dont-need-a-single-pa...) 31 points | 6 years ago | 24 comments

- Ask HN: What are the common pitfalls/problems of Single Page App's? 13 points | 9 years ago | 18 comments

Re: Building websites with lots of little HTML pages

#8

Post by gibibit » Wed, Mar 12, 2025, 8:02 PM UTC

arnley wrote: post #6

Views transitions are very useful in content-first websites. I've used them extensively when working on https://stack.lol Try and navigate through pages, or change the language, and you'll get these neat effects "for free". Frameworks like AstroJS also help a lot as they facilitate using view transitions.

I guess this is a matter of preference. I see when I click a link on stack.lol that the page header remains visible, but the rest of the page disappears (blanks to white) for a second before the next page appears.

I prefer a seamless experience of seeing the next page immediately without a "white flash" first. For instance, if I am looking at a GitHub project page and I click the "Issues" button, in a fraction of a second the page changes to the Issues page without any intermediate disappearance or partial page load.

In most cases, I find transition effects like fading, sliding, etc. to be an annoyance that adds unnecessary delay and visual distraction.

Re: Building websites with lots of little HTML pages

#9

Post by 0xdeadbeefbabe » Wed, Mar 12, 2025, 8:03 PM UTC

Terretta wrote: post #2

This is brilliant. Instead of a single page app (SPA), you can almost picture the connections between all these little .html pages as some sort of web.

It's like a world of webs.

Re: Building websites with lots of little HTML pages

#10

Post by nartho » Wed, Mar 12, 2025, 8:07 PM UTC

gibibit wrote: post #8

arnley wrote: post #6

Views transitions are very useful in content-first websites. I've used them extensively when working on https://stack.lol Try and navigate through pages, or change the language, and you'll get these neat effects "for free". Frameworks like AstroJS also help a lot as they facilitate using view transitions.

I guess this is a matter of preference. I see when I click a link on stack.lol that the page header remains visible, but the rest of the page disappears (blanks to white) for a second before the next page appears. I prefer a seamless experience of seeing the next page immediately without a "white flash" first. For instance, if I am looking at a GitHub project page and I click the "Issues" button, in a fraction of a s…

I believe this is related to the implementation of the light/dark theme. It uses the preferred theme but default to light, if your preferred theme is dark, it will take some time where it defaults to light before being set to dark. There are workarounds.