Overview
Zola (né Gutenberg) is a fast static site generator that comes in a single binary with everything built-in. It was created out of frustration with the Golang template engine and Hugo, a static site generator. With a focus on simplicity, Zola provides a wide range of features to make site generation and customization easier for users.
Features
- Single binary: Zola is built as a single executable file, making it easy to install and use.
- Syntax highlighting: Zola supports syntax highlighting for code snippets, making them visually appealing on the generated site.
- Sass compilation: Zola can compile Sass stylesheets, allowing users to leverage the power of Sass for styling their sites.
- Assets co-location: Zola supports co-locating assets with content, making it convenient to include images, scripts, and other resources in the same directory as the content they belong to.
- Multilingual site support: Zola provides basic support for creating multilingual sites, making it easier to manage content in multiple languages.
- Image processing: Zola can automatically process and optimize images, reducing their file size and improving site performance.
- Themes: Zola supports themes, allowing users to easily change the appearance of their site by applying pre-designed themes.
- Shortcodes: Zola provides shortcodes, which are reusable snippets of code that can be used to generate dynamic content or perform specific actions on the site.
- Internal links: Zola supports creating internal links between different pages or sections within the site.
- External link checker: Zola can automatically check for broken or invalid external links on the site.
- Table of contents automatic generation: Zola can generate a table of contents for long articles or pages, providing easy navigation for readers.
- Automatic header anchors: Zola automatically generates anchor links for headers, allowing users to easily link to specific sections within a page.
- Aliases: Zola supports creating aliases for pages, allowing users to redirect old URLs to new ones without losing traffic or SEO value.
- Pagination: Zola provides pagination support for generating multi-page content, such as blog posts or search results.
- Custom taxonomies: Zola allows users to define custom taxonomies for categorizing content, providing more flexibility in organizing and filtering content.
- Search with no servers or any third parties involved: Zola includes a search feature that works without the need for external servers or third-party services.
- Live reload: Zola supports live reloading, automatically refreshing the site in the browser whenever changes are made to the source files.
- Deploy on many platforms easily: Zola makes it easy to deploy the generated site on various platforms, including Netlify, Vercel, and Cloudflare.
- Breadcrumbs: Zola supports adding breadcrumbs to the site navigation, providing users with a clear path to the current page within the site structure.
Summary
Zola (né Gutenberg) is a powerful static site generator that provides a wide range of features for creating and customizing static websites. With its single binary approach and built-in capabilities, Zola aims to simplify the site generation process and make it accessible to users of all skill levels. Whether you need multilingual support, image processing, or seamless deployment to various platforms, Zola has you covered. It offers a flexible and efficient solution for building static websites with ease.