Does the Next Generation of Static Site Generators Make Building Sites Better?

I recently discovered îles, a new static site generator primarily built with Vue. While the market is saturated with SSGs, îles' approach offers an intriguing glimpse into the "next generation" and their priorities.

îles draws significant inspiration from Astro. Examining îles, Astro, and other rapidly evolving SSGs reveals common themes:

• JavaScript-Optional by Default: Interactive elements are explicitly enabled, mirroring the "islands" architecture. îles and Astro implement this at the component level, while SvelteKit handles it at the page level.
• Fine-Grained Hydration Control: Precise control over hydration timing, such as during idle browser periods or when components become visible, is a key feature.
• Blazing-Fast Build Tools: Leveraging Vite (which uses Go-based esbuild) or Rust-based swc (as seen in Next 12) for rapid builds.
• Multi-Framework Component Support: îles and Astro natively support multiple JavaScript frameworks, a capability Slinkity provides for Eleventy.
• File-System Routing: A common approach for defining site structure.
• Markdown Content: A prevalent assumption for content management.

Comparing these "next-gen" SSGs to earlier ones like Jekyll reveals several observations:

1. Subtle Differences: The core feature sets are surprisingly similar.
2. JavaScript's Rise: The most significant shift is the prevalent use of JavaScript libraries. This likely reflects a strong demand for component-based development, a need not fully addressed by earlier HTML preprocessors.
3. Incremental Improvements: These newer SSGs offer incremental enhancements in speed, live reloading, and overall usability.

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