Sharing HTML

A picture of a page is not a page. What automated conversion gets right, what it gets wrong, and what a design has to specify before it can be built.

A code printed on paper cannot be changed. What it points at can be, which decides whether the code still works in two years.

Publishing by archive works when the structure is right. Three mistakes account for nearly every failed upload, and all are visible before you send it.

One source file, two outputs. The fixed document is for printing and the page is for reading, and most sources should produce both.

Hosting means a machine serving your files at an address. Which kind you need depends on one question, and most sites need the simplest answer.

Technically straightforward and operationally constant. What self-hosting genuinely gives you, and the four things that make it a commitment.

Most small sites do not need a generator. Start with the pages, add a build step only when repetition makes it worth the machinery.

A form needs somewhere to send the submission. An outside service does that in one line, and the spam handling is the part that matters.

Static sites start ahead on speed and rendering. What remains is one page per question, real titles, and an address you never change.

Most advice addresses machinery a static site does not have. What remains is a certificate, the domain account, and what you put in the page.

On many small sites images are the largest part of the weight. Fixing them takes an hour and beats every other optimisation combined.

Export produces a folder with long identifiers in every filename and links that point inside the tool. What survives and what needs fixing.

Publish before the site is finished, at the real address, on the real domain. Everything discovered afterwards is discovered by visitors.

For a finished file, publishing is genuinely one step. What takes longer is the domain, and it is the only part worth doing carefully.

Generating a static copy removes the database, the plugins and the patching. What survives the conversion and what has to be replaced first.

Export produces markup positioned to match the page. It preserves appearance at one width and does not reflow, which is the point of a page.

LinkedIn does not run your HTML as a post. Choose a document or a working page link, inspect the preview, and keep page corrections separate from card updates.

Export a pandas DataFrame as a complete HTML report with number formatting, visible missing values, and runnable Python source.

Render a Quarto report into one HTML file, test the exported copy, and keep a reproducible source package. Includes a real rendered example.