JAMStack is an exciting part of web development, but keeping up with markdown files can be daunting. Choosing the right headless CMS for yourself or your client is an important step to saving a lot of headaches down the road.

Not sure where to begin? We can help!

What you'll learn

In this presentation, Jacob Hebert, Developer at Headway, will walk through headless CMS options such as Contentful or Forestry, how they work with JAMStack websites (Gatsby in particular), and the pros and cons of each to help choose the best option for your project.

If you're a developer wanting to use a headless CMS vs WordPress or a website owner trying to understand their options when it comes to headless CMS's - this presentation is for you!

Segments

‍01:33​ - Using Gatsby for SSG and Sourcing Content

‍02:55​ - Sourcing Locally - All About Markdown

‍15:53​ - Contentful - Properly Headless

‍33:15​ - Forestry.io - Return to Markdown

‍38:40​ - Headless CMS vs Traditional CMS

‍42:11​ - Contentful vs Netlify and Pricing

‍45:04​ - Forestry.io - Continued

‍53:14​ - Headless CMS Resources - Gatbsy Concepts

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Summary

• Headless CMS’s + Static Site Generator is a great way to manage content.
• Contentful (and other “true” headless CMS’s) allows you to create relationships between content, and have a resilient UI for content editors.
• Forestry and other git-based CMS’s allow you to store and track your content in Git but provide a clean and flexible UI for content editors.

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Access the Code on Github​

Static Sites with Gatsby - Podcast Episode

Learn About Jamstack​

GatsbyJS Documentation - Conceptual Guides​

Contentful

‍​Forestry

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Headless CMS resources

• Jamstack - Headless CMS
• GatsbyJS - Sourcing Data How-To
• Jamstack - Glossary

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Important terms to know:

• JAMStack ⇒ From jamstack.org: Jamstack is an architecture designed to make the web faster, more secure, and easier to scale. It builds on many of the tools and workflows which developers love, and which bring maximum productivity.
• CMS ⇒ Content Management System
• The core principles of pre-rendering and decoupling, enable sites and applications to be delivered with greater confidence and resilience than ever before.
• Headless CMS ⇒ CMS that is *view-layer agnostic.* This means you can store your data and edit it atomically without knowledge or definition of how or where the data will be displayed.

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