Eight

So, this is just an unordered dump of ideas on a long brewing topic: patterns of personal websites. Over two years ago, I've briefly mentioned in a weeknote that I've started collecting material. But that collection has also started to collect something: dust. Because I don't really have the energy to work on the topic properly, which means: deeply, over a a prolonged period of time. Basically the opposite of what I am doing right here, right now.

Pattern languages are very neat things. They can distill a lot of collective experiences in a short form. When written well, I'd say they even are their own kind of literature genre. They stay longer relevant than mere technical writings.

The pattern movement is way past the hype that surrounded them in the 1990es and the aughts. Personal websites are the same. They've become niche interests. But that doesn't mean they don't deserve intellectual attention. I could imaging a proper pattern language to serve fledgling personal websites to grow into intellectual online homes. — I just realized that with the last sentence I've already used a spatial and architectural methaphor, which seems fitting, as this is the real origin of the pattern language. All ways lead to the works of the late Christopher Alexander.

I have not yet come around to properly study and distill the previous works, although there aren't that many, and only three of those I've found actually target the non-commercial web. And maybe that idea of "prior art" research is all too academic. Maybe I should just start writing things down as I perceive them, and edit later.

Patterns are about solutions to recurring problems, about tensions or forces between possible design decisions. Patterns give names. Patterns are densely interconnected. Pattern languages are not prescriptive, but generative.

So, there are various flavours of personal websites. They could be one or more of: a Blog, a Digital Garden, a Wiki, Virtual Business card, a Hub to other networks, a Portfolio, a Commonplace book and probably many more. The list is not exhaustive, and for every site this kind of self-classification might change over time.

Then there are many aspects when it comes to designing the navigation. What is a mechanism and what is a policy? It might be a good idea to prevent your reader from getting lost. You might want to offer maps, indexes, archives. Your creations might be clustered in categories, your writing might be characterized in short by topics or tags. You might want to invite exploration and increase serendipity. You want your work to be discoverable, and maybe also highlight certains aspects. At some point search capabilities might come in handy. And you also want to connect, it is the web after all, and lead your readers away. For that you might expose a blogroll, or join a web ring to drive traffic through your web neighbourhood.

How do you think about your works? How is it categorizable? Which types of content are there? Are they mutually exclusive? Do they form some continuum? Is there a difference between an essay and a blog post? How do you handle drafts? Is a tutorial some special kind of writing? Are images a category of their own? How do you share very short form or ephemeral notes?

There are some pages that are so common, that they deserve a treatment of their own: About, Contact, Now, Uses, Projects. Some are less common, but are still maybe a good idea.

I am not done, but I'll make a cut here. I won't count how many questions I've asked or how many concepts I've touched, I've barely scratched the surface. So, if I think I have nothing to write about, I might simply revisting this page, and try to answer a single question from that staccato.