9 | The Tech Behind selfteach.me (Next.js and Sanity)

Amy talks about tech stack (Next.js, Sanity, and Tailwind) and some of the decisions she made while building selfteach.me. James and Amy also discuss form management for static sites and some marketing tactics.

SPONSORS

Vercel

Vercel combines the best developer experience with an obsessive focus on end-user performance. Their platform enables frontend teams to do their best work. It is the best place to deploy any frontend app. Start by deploying with zero configuration to their global edge network. Scale dynamically to millions of pages without breaking a sweat.

For more information, visit Vercel.com

ZEAL is hiring!

Zeal is a computer software agency that delivers “the world’s most zealous” and custom solutions. The company plans and develops web and mobile applications that consistently help clients draw in customers, foster engagement, scale technologies, and ensure delivery.

Zeal believes that a business is “only as strong as” its team and cares about culture, values, a transparent process, leveling up, giving back, and providing excellent equipment. The company has staffers distributed throughout the United States, and as it continues to grow, Coding Zeal looks for collaborative, object-oriented, and organized individuals to apply for open roles.

For more information visit codingzeal.com

KwesForms

KwesForms is the only complete developer-focused form service in the world. Build any type of form. Integrate it into any framework. No drag and drop, no unnecessary stylings. Set up advanced forms for clients on any platform. It works perfectly with any framework. Right out of the box.

For more information, visit kwes.io

Show Notes

0:00 Introduction

3:31 Sponsor: ZEAL

4:27 Related Episodes

• Episode 3 - Compressed.fm Tech Stack
• Episode 8 - JamesQQuick.com Tech Stack

5:20 First iteration of the site: on WordPress

6:01 Rebuilding the Site on Gatsby and MDX

• Pros of Gatsby:
  • Site Speed
  • Markdown
  • Including React Components
• Cons: Maxing build times on Netlify
  • Long build times
  • Constantly restarting Gatsby

10:39 Moving to Sanity for content

• Portable Text FTW!
• Better Developer Experience

17:31 Using Tailwind CSS

• Explaining Utility-Based Framework
• PurgeCSS

20:27 Experimenting with New Technologies

20:44 Pros for using Tailwind

• Naming things is hard
• Specificity
• Everyone is working from a similar naming convention
• Remove HTML, remove the the corresponding CSS = cleaner codebase

22:57 Sponsor: Vercel

25:35 Sponsor: KwesForms

29:13 Using RightMessage for marketing

31:55 Soft Launch vs Hard Launch

33:54 Things you'd do differently

34:07 Reduce the barrier to entry

35:57 Move to Styled Components

37:19 Grab Bag Question #1: how can you deliver rich experiences like MDX with Sanity and SvelteKit?

38:50 Grab Bag Question #2: Is it easy to switch from React to Next?

41:11 James's Pick: Book by Reggie Ford PTSD

42:31 James's Plug: James Q Quick on YouTube

42:51 Amy's Pick: RoadID

44:06 Amy's Plug: SelfTeach.me on YouTube