Andrew is a web server like web servers used to be™.
- It renders web pages from the file system, no databases involved. This is the basic design restriction that informs feature decisions.
- You write html files, css files and javascript, in a standard directory hierarchy. No opinions about frameworks, Andrew's just a web server.
- You get started by writing an "index.html" file and then running Andrew from that directory.
- You can optionally provide an ssl certificate and key. No need for nginx or something to front Andrew.
- Convenient support for creating lists of files from the current directory down, so you don't need to maintain that list by hand. You control
the specific order of the pages in the list by simply providing an html meta tag in your
<head>element - Sitemap automatically generated from your file system layout, as search engines like to see this for brand new websites.
- RSS Feed automatically generated from your file system layout. Folks can subscript at
baseUrl/rss.xml
I wanted an http server that allows me to add a simple go template instruction into an index.html that is replaced with the contents of any html files that are below the current index.html in the file system hierarchy.
Andrew contains the concept of an AndrewPage. This structure makes various pieces of metadata stored within your web page available to Andrew for creating links and sorting pages in the various tables of contents available (see below). The specifics are explained below, but conceptually I'm trying to use standard html elements to inform Andrew about site metadata. For more you may want to check the Architecture.md
go install github.com/playtechnique/andrew/cmd/andrew@latest is the simple way.
There are github releases, too. You can find compiled binaries at https://github.com/PlayTechnique/andrew/releases for linux, windows, and macOS for both amd64 and arm64 on all systems.
Here's how I install andrew through Docker:
FROM golang:1.23 AS base
WORKDIR /usr/src/app
ENV CGO_ENABLED=0
RUN go install github.com/playtechnique/andrew/cmd/andrew@v0.1.5
FROM scratch
COPY --from=base /etc/passwd /etc/passwd
USER 1000
COPY --from=base /go/bin/andrew /andrew
COPY --chown=1000:1000 content /website
EXPOSE 8080
ENTRYPOINT ["/andrew"]
arguments are mandatory. Options aren't.
andrew accepts up to three arguments, in this order:
andrew [contentRoot] [address] [baseUrl]contentRoot is the directory you're serving from, that contains your top level index.html. andrew follows apache's lead on expecting index.html in any directory as a default page.
address is the address you want to bind the server to. Specify as an address:port combination.
baseUrl is the hostname you're serving from. This is a part of sitemaps and future rss feeds. It also contains the protocol
e.g. https://playtechnique.io
-h | --help - show the help
-c | --cert - this is a paired option with the option below. The path to an SSL cert bundle.
-p |--privatekey - this is paired with the option above. The path to your ssl private key.
-d |--rssdescription - a short description of your RSS feed.
-t |--rsstitle - the title for your RSS feed.
Want to serve your site over https? So does everyone else!
Start up andrew with the arguments --cert and --privatekey.
If you forget one of them, but supply the other, you'll get a helpful error reminding you what you need to do.
Andrew happily serves over https. It also serves over http.
.AndrewTableOfContents
.AndrewTableOfContentsWithDirectories
These are for generating lists of web pages that exist at the same level in the file system as the web page and in child directories.
Note that each of these creates its items inside a div. Here's your cheat sheet:
.AndrewTableOfContents becomes a div with class AndrewTableOfContents
.AndrewTableOfContentsWithDirectories becomes a div with class AndrewTableOfContentsWithDirectories
Andrew sorts by page publish date. This publish date is tricky for a file-based web server to get consistent, so here's the rules:
- If you have the tag
<meta name="andrew-publish-time" content="YYYY-MM-DD"/>, Andrew uses this date. - If you have the tag
<meta name="andrew-publish-time" content="YYYY-MM-DD HH:MM:SS"/>, Andrew refines the date with the time published. This allows you to publish several articles on the same day and get the ordering correct.. - Andrew uses the page's mtime. This means that if you edit a page that does not contain the
andrew-publish-timeelement, then you will push it back to the top of the list. This is the worst solution if you're using andrew in a container.
If you want to automate generating the datestamp, this'll get you where you want to be on macOS or linux date +"%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S"
<meta name="andrew-publish-time" content="YYYY-MM-DD"/>
<title>Your page title</title>All meta elements are actually parsed in the Andrew Page, but Andrew doesn't use a lot of them just yet.
I've tried to consistently include the string andrew in front of any CSS classes or IDs, so they're less likely to
clash with your whimsy for laying out your own site.
The reason these classes and IDs exist is simple: it makes it easier for you to style Andrew's unstyled HTML. I don't want Andrew making decisions about your website's layout.
I include classes and IDs that get my sites looking how I want. If you need more, file a request.
AndrewTableOfContents is for rendering a table of contents of the pages beneath the current page. It only lists page links.
If you want your links grouped by directories, check out .AndrewTableOfContentsWithDirectories.
This is handled in linksbuilder.go. I try to keep this README up to date, but if seems like it doesn't sync with reality the final word is the source code.
Given this file system structure:
index.html
articles/
index.html
article-1.html
article-2.html
article-2.css
article-1.js
fanfics/
index.html
story-1/
potter-and-draco.html
story-2/
what-if-elves-rode-mice-pt1.html
what-if-elves-rode-mice-pt2.html
if articles/index.html contains {{ .AndrewTableOfContents }} anywhere, that will be replaced with a div like this one:
<div class="AndrewTableOfContents">
<ul>
<li><a class="andrewtableofcontentslink" id="andrewtableofcontentslink0" href="article-1.html">article 1</a> - <span class=\"publish-date\">0000-00-01</span></li>
<li><a class="andrewtableofcontentslink" id="andrewtableofcontentslink1" href="article-2.html">article 2</a> - <span class=\"publish-date\">0000-00-01</span></li>
</ul>
</div>if fanfics/index.html contains {{ .AndrewTableOfContents }}, that'll be replaced with a div like this one:
<div class="AndrewTableOfContents">
<ul>
<li><a class="andrewtableofcontentslink" id="andrewtableofcontentslink0" href="story-1/potter-and-draco.html">Potter and Draco</a> - <span class=\"publish-date\">0000-00-01</span></li>
<li><a class="andrewtableofcontentslink" id="andrewtableofcontentslink1" href="story-2/what-if-elves-rode-mice-pt1.html">what-if-elves-rode-mice-pt1.html</a> - <span class=\"andrew-page-publish-date\">0000-00-01</span></li>
<li><a class="andrewtableofcontentslink" id="andrewtableofcontentslink2" href="story-2/what-if-elves-rode-mice-pt1.html">what-if-elves-rode-mice-pt2.html</a> - <span class=\"andrew-page-publish-date\">0000-00-01</span></li>
</ul>
</div>Given this file system structure:
groupedContents.html
articles/
index.html #this will be ignored. index.html normally contains its own listing of pages, but this is already a page list.
article-1.html
article-2.css #this will be ignored; Andrew only links to html files.
articles-series/
dragons-are-lovely.html
dragons-are-fierce.html
if index.html contains {{ .AndrewTableOfContentsWithDirectories }} anywhere, that will be replaced with a <div> called AndrewTableOfContentsWithDirectories.
Inside the <div> is a decent representation of all of your content:
<div class="AndrewTableOfContentsWithDirectories">
<ul>
<h5>articles/</h5>
<li><a class="andrewtableofcontentslink" id="andrewtableofcontentslink0" href="articles/article-1.html">article-1.html</a> - <span class="andrew-page-publish-date">0001-01-01</span></li>
</ul>
<ul>
<h5><span class="AndrewParentDir">articles/</span>articles-series/</h5>
<li><a class="andrewtableofcontentslink" id="andrewtableofcontentslink1" href="articles/articles-series/dragons-are-lovely.html">dragons-are-lovely.html</a> - <span class="andrew-page-publish-date">0001-01-01</span></li>
<li><a class="andrewtableofcontentslink" id="andrewtableofcontentslink1" href="articles/articles-series/dragons-are-fierce.html">dragons-are-fierce.html</a> - <span class="andrew-page-publish-date">0001-01-01</span></li>
</ul>
</div>Note the inclusion of a <span> around the name of the parent directory. The parent directory name is a bit repetitive, so I wanted to
be able to style it to not draw attention to it.
If the above seems out of sync with reality, the easiest place to get a canonical representation of what Andrew's building will be in linksbuilder_test.go
If a page contains a <title> element, Andrew picks it up and uses that as the name of a link.
If the page does not contain a <title> element, then Andrew will use the file name of that file as the link name.
Andrew parses meta tags and makes them accessible on its AndrewPage object.
When the endpoint baseUrl/sitemap.xml is visited, Andrew will automatically generate a sitemap containing paths to all html pages.
When the endpoint baseUrl/rss.xml is visited, Andrew will automatically generate an RSS feed with all your articles in! We love an RSS feed <3