Today, I started a new project with Kirby CMS. (No, it’s not my personal site. That one’s still brewing…)
Kirby is a lightweight, no-fuzz content management system (CMS) created by Bastian Allgeier, which works well for projects of any size. It is easy to install and amazing to work with in development, also because it adapts to the structure and size of your project and you can flexibly configure the interface of the backend, the Kirby Panel, accordingly.
Kirby is a so-called flat file CMS, which means that in order to create the structure of your website (“app”) with all its subpages and routes etc., you basically create a folder structure and put text files or images inside of those folders. Kirby then pulls the content from those files and displays them. This speeds up the initial setup of the project structure a lot and also means that, if you want to, you can put all your content in the same Git repository you’re using for the rest of your code. No database needed. The nice thing is: your team mates, clients, or content managers don’t have to be as nerdy as you and can still use the Panel to add and edit content as well. As a developer, you get the full flexibility of writing your own templates and template snippets and you can use the many smart, built-in objects and methods to display and manipulate your content. Kirby has great docs, a rich plugin ecosystem, an API to interact with your site or access content, and it can also be used as a headless CMS. The team behind and the community around the CMS is lovely and always ready to support you via the Community Forum , which is already full of answers as well. One last thing: a lot of people seem to be prejudiced against PHP these days, so you will be delighted to learn that Kirby is based on PHP with all the robustness and broad support across the industry that comes with it. 😉
Kirby = Successful Projects
So yes, as you might have noticed by now, I am a big fan of Kirby, especially because it allows you to solve common problems in a straightforward way, making my life as a designer and developer so much easier, but also because my clients have always been very happy with the content editing experience in the backend – without exception. Kirby enables successful projects.
But it is not only really useful to build client projects. It also powers loads of personal websites and side projects. So if you are looking for a CMS that is fast as heck and a joy to work with, I’d give it a try.
My plan is to share a bit of my experience and process from this project and from building a few projects with Kirby in the past here on my site. I don’t know which steps or learnings will make it into a post, but I’d love to document a few crucial steps for myself and anyone who wants to build a site with Kirby.
If there is anything that you would like to learn, let me know via a blog post of your own – and a Webmention – or on Mastodon. Although I certainly don’t have all the answers, I might run into similar challenges and feel the urge to share how a solution could look like.
Oh! Have you published a post, a tutorial, a plugin, or anything else that could be useful for the community? Let me know as well.
PS: My friend Manuel Matuzović is rebuilding his personal site with Kirby at the moment and shares his process and many useful tricks on how to build a modern, accessible website in short videos on Vimeo.
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