Statiki (Work in Progress)

Quoting from here:

Several years ago, I began using Instiki to record RPG-related ideas, bits of constructed languages, and notional computer projects like these. The project went through multiple revisions, including a change of database and a port to Rails.

UPDATE: Since I wrote this, the new version runs on Ruby 3.x. However I still have to start up a whole new server, and edit only through the Wiki editor page.

“Statiki” mimics a wiki, but with statically generated HTML pages I can browse directly.

To summarize:

1. A command line tool creates new pages from a template, similar to “hugo new path”. The pages are files in a directory under version control consisting of a “front matter” section and a text area.

2. I edit the page front matter and text to my satisfaction. The front matter includes a title, a creation date, a last modification date, and a list of tags, categories, etc. The text section may include the following:

   • Markdown, including tables, footnotes, and other extensions.
   • References to other pages as [[page title]].

3. The tool formats the Markdown+Wiki page into an HTML page:

   • A configurable template provides all the elements of a complete page, including a TITLE and CSS stylesheets.
   • The template generates a table of contents.
   • Markdown becomes HTML, just like hugo.
   • [[title]] elements become hyperlinks to the page with the given title.
   • (Optional) The “last edited” (lastmod?) date updates automatically.
   • (Optional) Short files under a directory with a specially configured index page get concatenated into single, long files with headers and internal links. E.g. glossary terms, RPG spells, monster manual entries.
   • (Optional) Files under a directory with a specially configured index page and ordering information in each file’s front matter get automatic “previous”, “next”, and “up” links, much like GNU Info pages or “sphinx” documentation.

4. The tool also integrates the page with other pages.

   • An index of all pages.
   • A list of pages by tag or category.
   • A map between pages and all pages that refer to them.
   • A map between pages and all pages to which they refer.
   • A list of orphaned pages.

5. All pages are browsable as static pages with relative links or through a lightweight page server. (Again, like hugo.)

I’ve been toying with a hugo project and instance, and the features I miss most are Wiki Words and an ability to concatenate very short files into a longer page with internal links. (One project is a space opera setting and three pages are just a list of planets, a list of species, and a list of technologies including starships.)

The algorithm for step #3 & #4 might go like this:

• Traverse one or more directories, building a map of page titles to page content.
• Render each page, replacing a WikiWord or name in [[…]] with a relative URL to the destination page.
• Write index pages for all pages in a ‘statiki’ and for each category found.

Possible markdown engines include: