Web Development Beginner

What is Static Site Generator (SSG)?

A tool that generates a complete static HTML website from templates and content at build time, requiring no server-side processing.

SSGs pre-render all pages at build time, producing plain HTML/CSS/JS files that can be served from any web server or CDN. This provides excellent performance, security (no server-side code), and reliability.

Popular SSGs include Hugo (Go), Jekyll (Ruby), Gatsby (React), Eleventy (JS), and Astro. Content can come from Markdown files, headless CMSs, or APIs. SSGs are ideal for blogs, documentation, marketing sites, and any content that does not change per-request.

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A two-dimensional CSS layout system for creating complex grid-based designs with rows and columns.

SSR (Server-Side Rendering)

A technique where web pages are rendered on the server and sent as complete HTML to the browser, improving SEO and initial load time.

A widely-used server-side scripting language designed for web development that powers over 75% of websites including WordPress.

Structured Data (Schema.org)

A standardized vocabulary for marking up web content so search engines can understand and display it as rich results.

Storing copies of frequently accessed data in faster storage to reduce load times and server processing.

HTML elements in the page head that provide metadata about the document for browsers, search engines, and social media platforms.

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