Recently I’ve done a complete makeover of my personal website, previous was really more like a cliche portfolio website. At least at that time when I was creating my old website I would always have peak at other portfolios and then I would copy the flashy parts. In the end my website was a mash-up/copy of other people. Naturally I thought that It should look like all of them because someone might questions my skills and competence. But I always knew that it was missing the point.

My old website

Previous website was single page with one long scrollable page which contained a lot empty space and had a lot of images of myself. But again that’s how other websites looked. At the bottom of the page there was a big big contact form as if I am some kind of company website and every one will write me emails. In reality I got maybe just few emails over a year. That makes me wonder how many email I would have gotten if my email would have been just a simple text link. I guess it would have been easier for me and for visitor. The website in many cases was unnecessary complicated.

My new website

With a new website I decided to take more minimalistic approach. Somehow I come to realization that I don’t need those flashy parts, simply because I don’t sell myself I just want to talk and share ideas with other developers. Therefore I’ve decided to create simple website with a blog. In my understanding by writing blog posts we as developers learn better and In the end our ideas and findings might be useful ot others. For my starting point I’ve used Jekyll now which I customized heavily.

It’s like a canvas

Essentially I’ve learned that personal websites should reflect who you really are as a developer. It should be more like a canvas where you express your self. I suggest to resist cramping website with a lot of graphics, animations or javascript just to show off your skills it is not a great idea if you don’t have a clear vision. We can always show our projects on GitHub. In the end just try to add some personality (geeky, artsy …) to website and it will make you stand out from the rest.

P.S. I recommend to watch a talk by Rich Hickey ‘Simple Made Easy’ he explains amazingly well what is simplicity in programming, which can by applied to any field.