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Without knowing your OS: a text editor of some sort and an FTP/SFTP client. Then just get shared web hosting account - there are lots to chose from and they ar

by gbuk2013 7y ago

Without knowing your OS: a text editor of some sort and an FTP/SFTP client. Then just get shared web hosting account - there are lots to chose from and they are super cheap these days. You can go a long way with that without having to mess around with maintaining your own server (unless you want to - I do :)

melling 7y ago
One person with a simple text editor isn’t going to be nearly as productive as someone who chooses a modern stack with better tools. I left open my prior tools, etc so as not to bias the answers. I’ve done lots of Java, Python, Swift, some Go, etc but I’m willing to learn anything, so forget that you know that. I’m looking for a big lever.
- gbuk2013 7y ago
  No, it really is that simple, if you are taking about a “website”, not a “web application” or some sort of “platform”. Learn to do it by hand or you will forever be dependent on tools. VSCode or Atom is what everyone seems to be using but the more you are able to treat it as a text editor the better you will be. But since you say you are comfortable with programming, then a static site generator might be interesting for you. Pick one in whatever language you prefer. Be prepared to spend a lot of time before you are as productive as writing it by hand.
  - melling 7y ago
    You seem to not understand what I’m asking. I have Atom, VSCode, Sublime, JetBrains, ... I know vi and Emacs. I’ve programmed websites in Perl, Python, Java, Go, ... I didn’t realize we differentiate between applications and sites these days. In 2019, I’m one person who is willing to start with a clean slate. What current tools should I choose so, as one person, I’m most productive 6 months from now, once I’ve mastered the new tools. The idea is to choose an above average stack: http://www.paulgraham.com/avg.html http://www.paulgraham.com/avg.html
    - saagarjha 7y ago
      You're looking for buzzwords when the parent is trying to give you a stack that has worked worked for decades. You bringing up the "Beating the Averages" post isn't relevant.
      - melling 7y ago
        Sure, it’s very relevant: “Software is a very competitive business, prone to natural monopolies. A company that gets software written faster and better will, all other things being equal, put its competitors out of business. And when you're starting a startup, you feel this very keenly.” I’m not exactly sure why what I’m asking is not clear. One person with great tools can accomplish a lot more than a small team with average tools. Wasn’t that the reason Ruby was a much better choice than Java/JSP a decade ago? I was never allowed to chose Ruby, for example, because my company required Java. Today, there are even more options and it’s not clear where to begin the evaluation.
        spc476 7y ago
        You seem to be asking for a single clear answer. Okay, here's one: node.js. Learn it. Live it. Love it. Use VS Code. Learn it. Live it. Love it. Is this the best combination? Many seem to use it (it's the current hotness that all the hipsters are using) so it must be good. If that's not a satisfactory answer, ask yourself why it isn't. As for the "software written faster and better will ... put its competitors out of business" quote, take a look at Microsoft. They were never the first to market, and often times, it took them three or more attempts to get something correct. Yet they're still a juggernaut of a company. Being first doesn't mean you'll win---just as often you'll end up with arrows in your back. It really depends upon what you want to do. My own website [1] is written in XML and I use XSLT to convert it to HTML [2]. My blog [3] uses a mixture of C and Lua [4] because that's what works for me. A great craftsman can make wonderful items with average tools that an average craftsman with great tools cannot. It's not just the tools, but how well you understand them and what their limitations are [5]. Also, the industry changes. Hell, javascript didn't even exist when I started making websites. Nor did Java. I got taught CS 101 in Fortran of all languages. The only constant is change, so stop asking what's best, and just start working. You'll find out what works for you and what doesn't. [1] http://www.conman.org/ http://www.conman.org/ [2] I wanted an easier way to maintain the links among all the pages (next section, previous section, next page, previous page, etc.) instead of modifying static files. XSLT was the new hotness at the time. I won't say it was a mistake, but I haven't bothered changing the underlying technology since. [3] http://boston.conman.org/ http://boston.conman.org/ [4] https://github.com/spc476/mod_blog https://github.com/spc476/mod_blog [5] I know of a bridge player (a card game) who took the time to learn x86 assembly language to write his own bridge playing software, and from my understanding, at the time it was a "best of breed" type program. Could he have been more productive in another language? Perhaps. Perhaps not.
- egypturnash 7y ago
  WordPress. It’s profoundly unsexy. It’s also solid. Do you want to fuck around with building another CMS that nobody but you will use, and which you will probably only use for about three posts before throwing it out and making another CMS built on today’s hot tools? Or do you want a website that you can get to be reasonably pretty without much work, and which you can update from multiple devices? Seriously I spent a while setting up WP a decade ago and it’s been where I post everything I make. I don’t have to futz with it unless I want to make a cool new theme for a new comics project, it just sits there updating itself for me and waiting for me to feel like writing a new post or whatever. (Okay I do need to spend some time futzing with it soon, the latest WP update won’t run on the decade-old version of PHP I set it up with, and something in it breaks when I try to switch which version my shared host is using. That’s once in like a decade.)
PavlovsCat 7y ago
> a text editor of some sort and an FTP/SFTP client. I very much agree in the sense of start simple, and grow. My progression was plain html, html plus php for header and footer, text file based CMS, finally a db-backed CMS that does everything I want how I want it. But that was also starting with knowing next to nothing, and to do it differently (more "efficiently") from the get go, I would have needed to just accept advice to use X, without really understanding what it does for me. I was a bit stubborn and not just suffering from NIH syndrome, I was in the cult of NIH. But I learned, it was fun, and I am glad how it worked out.

melling 7y ago

One person with a simple text editor isn’t going to be nearly as productive as someone who chooses a modern stack with better tools. I left open my prior tools, etc so as not to bias the answers. I’ve done lots of Java, Python, Swift, some Go, etc but I’m willing to learn anything, so forget that you know that. I’m looking for a big lever.

gbuk2013 7y ago
No, it really is that simple, if you are taking about a “website”, not a “web application” or some sort of “platform”. Learn to do it by hand or you will forever be dependent on tools. VSCode or Atom is what everyone seems to be using but the more you are able to treat it as a text editor the better you will be. But since you say you are comfortable with programming, then a static site generator might be interesting for you. Pick one in whatever language you prefer. Be prepared to spend a lot of time before you are as productive as writing it by hand.
- melling 7y ago
  You seem to not understand what I’m asking. I have Atom, VSCode, Sublime, JetBrains, ... I know vi and Emacs. I’ve programmed websites in Perl, Python, Java, Go, ... I didn’t realize we differentiate between applications and sites these days. In 2019, I’m one person who is willing to start with a clean slate. What current tools should I choose so, as one person, I’m most productive 6 months from now, once I’ve mastered the new tools. The idea is to choose an above average stack: http://www.paulgraham.com/avg.html http://www.paulgraham.com/avg.html
  - saagarjha 7y ago
    You're looking for buzzwords when the parent is trying to give you a stack that has worked worked for decades. You bringing up the "Beating the Averages" post isn't relevant.
    - melling 7y ago
      Sure, it’s very relevant: “Software is a very competitive business, prone to natural monopolies. A company that gets software written faster and better will, all other things being equal, put its competitors out of business. And when you're starting a startup, you feel this very keenly.” I’m not exactly sure why what I’m asking is not clear. One person with great tools can accomplish a lot more than a small team with average tools. Wasn’t that the reason Ruby was a much better choice than Java/JSP a decade ago? I was never allowed to chose Ruby, for example, because my company required Java. Today, there are even more options and it’s not clear where to begin the evaluation.
      - spc476 7y ago
        You seem to be asking for a single clear answer. Okay, here's one: node.js. Learn it. Live it. Love it. Use VS Code. Learn it. Live it. Love it. Is this the best combination? Many seem to use it (it's the current hotness that all the hipsters are using) so it must be good. If that's not a satisfactory answer, ask yourself why it isn't. As for the "software written faster and better will ... put its competitors out of business" quote, take a look at Microsoft. They were never the first to market, and often times, it took them three or more attempts to get something correct. Yet they're still a juggernaut of a company. Being first doesn't mean you'll win---just as often you'll end up with arrows in your back. It really depends upon what you want to do. My own website [1] is written in XML and I use XSLT to convert it to HTML [2]. My blog [3] uses a mixture of C and Lua [4] because that's what works for me. A great craftsman can make wonderful items with average tools that an average craftsman with great tools cannot. It's not just the tools, but how well you understand them and what their limitations are [5]. Also, the industry changes. Hell, javascript didn't even exist when I started making websites. Nor did Java. I got taught CS 101 in Fortran of all languages. The only constant is change, so stop asking what's best, and just start working. You'll find out what works for you and what doesn't. [1] http://www.conman.org/ http://www.conman.org/ [2] I wanted an easier way to maintain the links among all the pages (next section, previous section, next page, previous page, etc.) instead of modifying static files. XSLT was the new hotness at the time. I won't say it was a mistake, but I haven't bothered changing the underlying technology since. [3] http://boston.conman.org/ http://boston.conman.org/ [4] https://github.com/spc476/mod_blog https://github.com/spc476/mod_blog [5] I know of a bridge player (a card game) who took the time to learn x86 assembly language to write his own bridge playing software, and from my understanding, at the time it was a "best of breed" type program. Could he have been more productive in another language? Perhaps. Perhaps not.
egypturnash 7y ago
WordPress. It’s profoundly unsexy. It’s also solid. Do you want to fuck around with building another CMS that nobody but you will use, and which you will probably only use for about three posts before throwing it out and making another CMS built on today’s hot tools? Or do you want a website that you can get to be reasonably pretty without much work, and which you can update from multiple devices? Seriously I spent a while setting up WP a decade ago and it’s been where I post everything I make. I don’t have to futz with it unless I want to make a cool new theme for a new comics project, it just sits there updating itself for me and waiting for me to feel like writing a new post or whatever. (Okay I do need to spend some time futzing with it soon, the latest WP update won’t run on the decade-old version of PHP I set it up with, and something in it breaks when I try to switch which version my shared host is using. That’s once in like a decade.)

PavlovsCat 7y ago

> a text editor of some sort and an FTP/SFTP client. I very much agree in the sense of start simple, and grow. My progression was plain html, html plus php for header and footer, text file based CMS, finally a db-backed CMS that does everything I want how I want it. But that was also starting with knowing next to nothing, and to do it differently (more "efficiently") from the get go, I would have needed to just accept advice to use X, without really understanding what it does for me. I was a bit stubborn and not just suffering from NIH syndrome, I was in the cult of NIH. But I learned, it was fun, and I am glad how it worked out.