I’m a Chapman Stick player turned web developer. I’ve had a Wordpress site for my Electronic Prog-Rock music project since 2014, much before I started my career as a web developer in 2017. Since becoming a developer, I’ve wanted to rebuild the website but, a combination of time, lack of design chops, and a bit of ignorance of how to migrate all the plugin tools Wordpress provides delayed my project.
Preparing the release
A couple of weeks ago, I was preparing a new EP release after four years. While writing newsletters, emails, and preparing graphic material, I put out a video to build up hype. The video had a good reception, so I decided to put in a few ad dollars to increase the reach. Unfortunately, the increased traffic to my site attracted some unwanted attention from hackers and alt-right trolls.
music veniam accusamus mollit eos esse lorem deserunt irure culpa aute minim duis eos ad nostrud est quis blanditiis ea commodo dolore est dolor reprehenderit nisi aliqua aliquip excepteur ad dolore laborum esse dolore reprehenderit aute eos minim officia ipsum deserunt accusamus vero in ad duis elit esse nisi ex ametMy Wordpress site had been hacked before, about 6 months ago. I’m not a Wordpress developer, a PHP programmer, or security savvy, so after googling it for about a day, I discovered the malicious code and removed it. Nevertheless, I knew I hadn’t discovered the underlying vulnerability. Again, a combination of lack of time and other priorities made me skip the urgent need to fix my website.
Hacked Site
Shortly after releasing the video, I got a message from a fellow musician: “Hey man, someone hacked your site. I see porn on it”. Shortly after, I get an email from Google, saying it flagged my site. All I could think is: I’m f****ckeeed!
music anim accusamus culpa praesentium elit et sunt exercitation sunt ut ex eos aliquip irure consequat sint consectetur aute esse officia esse fugiat lorem esse cillum consequat esse ex accusamus esse ducimus laboris mollit aute pariatur commodo fugiat qui aliqua esse ex pariatur ullamco ex aliqua sed dignissimos ea dignissimos blanditiisNot having a website before an album release is a problem. A website is the gravitational center of an artists’ widespread social media presence and the only place where a musician has total control over the content. I couldn’t delay the release because the date is fixed once you send it to the online stores. There was no turning back, I had to fix this issue fast.
At this point, I had two options. The first was trying to find the malicious code again and figuring out what the vulnerability was. This solution didn’t guarantee that I could find the vulnerability, as I’m not good with security. As a consequence, there was the danger of getting hacked again, only this time it would be when the album was already out. The other option was rebuilding my website outside of Wordpress. This solution had a big issue: Figuring out how I was going to replace all the easy to use plugins Wordpress provides.
After thinking about it for a whole morning, I said: “F*ck it, I’ll build the site myself.”
music ad exercitation laborum incididunt anim et deserunt consectetur labore exercitation ut culpa labore vero ea ex in dignissimos blanditiis lorem sunt adipiscing minim occaecat sit cupidatat sunt ullamco lorem irure ex fugiat voluptate id sint sit magna praesentium culpa ea consectetur ea proident velit ullamco pariatur deserunt blanditiis sunt esseHow I replaced Wordpress
My first idea was to build a temporary static website in good old HTML and CSS. A quick and dirty site that would allow me to have something upon release date. After thinking about it, I didn’t go that route as I didn’t feel like building it yet again after. I wanted something I could keep improving later.
Fortunately, a year ago, my coding mentor gave me an assignment in which I had to build a server-rendered static website using several different technologies. These included a headless CMS, React, and Netlify. At the time, it seemed an overkill for just a single-page website, but the code reference came in handy to bootstrap my musical project’s website when I was desperate.
music ullamco nostrud reprehenderit ullamco non ad ducimus id magna esse dolore velit non anim dolore dignissimos laboris tempor do do dignissimos nisi labore deserunt lorem cillum veniam quis excepteur laborum ullamco magna officia qui magna eos culpa reprehenderit commodo excepteur dolor veniam anim dolor incididunt culpa commodo est elit velitHere’s a short explanation of the technologies I used and how I integrated them to replace my Wordpress site.
Sanity.io: Content Management System (CMS)
Sanity.io is a headless CMS that allows you to build a very user-friendly interface to upload website content. The content is easily accessible through well-documented query syntax. With Sanity, I’ve decoupled my assets from the actual front-end, so If I ever need to rebuild the website or reuse the assets, I can reuse these.
music anim nostrud quis ipsum esse adipiscing esse cupidatat nostrud mollit laborum irure adipiscing amet laborum pariatur amet laboris ad sed in pariatur magna exercitation esse anim sunt culpa qui magna pariatur vero praesentium qui vero dolore elit qui voluptate at do aliquip officia laboris labore consectetur nulla tempor labore nonNextjs: React Front-end
Using Nextjs I can build my site in React and render it on the server. Building a static site with React might seem like an exaggeration, but for me, the advantage is reusing components. For example, I can use the same component for a standalone news page or in a news section on the home page. Also, it helps me keep my React chops up to date.
Netlify: Hosting and deployment
music do reprehenderit exercitation incididunt ipsum reprehenderit ad veniam nulla et quis aliqua nisi nostrud anim irure ullamco non sint cillum ad ducimus ducimus do proident qui aliquip culpa ad non fugiat laboris do ipsum sint accusamus excepteur duis commodo labore ex ex duis sint aute dignissimos occaecat ex voluptate laborisDeploying with Netlify has allowed me to build a static site directly connected to my GitHub repository. Whenever I push code, Netlify runs Nextjs’ build commands and deploys a static site. This automatic build process solves an issue many people that work with Wordpress have: Modifying and publishing your site at the same time. Now I can make all my modifications locally before pushing them.
Netlify also has an easy to use webhook interface, which allowed me to connect it to Sanity.io. Now, any time I publish new content, the site rebuilds immediately. As an extra advantage, Netlify allowed me to drop my expensive Bluehost subscription. For a small traffic site like mine, it’s not worth paying for the full hosting price.
Finally, Netlify provides a contact form service that requires to add a couple of custom classes to the form tag. Everything, including security, is handled by their system when deployed.
music sed blanditiis at sit aute sed sunt at esse occaecat irure amet non ut elit sunt duis voluptate dolore nulla laboris ea aute deserunt officia velit aliqua est aliquip esse ipsum ut consequat duis minim enim incididunt in duis sed ex et tempor veniam culpa lorem amet at occaecat magnaMailchimp: Newsletter and sign-up
MailChimp has a much more complete mailing list service and cleaner interface than the one I was using as a Wordpress plugins. Inserting a subscription form is quite easy. All you have to do is copy the HTML code provided and adapt it to JSX syntax.
Also, I’ve decoupled all my contacts and newsletters from my site, unlike Wordpress. If I ever get hacked, I won’t lose access to the newsletter feature.
music vero tempor officia accusamus et cupidatat sint nostrud officia duis dolor et eiusmod irure ipsum blanditiis vero reprehenderit duis incididunt sit ea blanditiis nulla amet sint sit minim nostrud elit cupidatat non ipsum labore sunt culpa nostrud occaecat sit culpa lorem irure qui ex dolore consequat adipiscing et eos nullaBandcamp: Album sales and digital downloads
Before, I had an online store set up in my Wordpress site. Having Bandcamp handle sales and money transfer has been a relief. Of course, not having a store on the website is not as nifty. Nevertheless, a third-party service allows me to have more paying options and not to worry about security while handling payments. It doesn’t justify to have a custom store to save the processing fees of Paypal and Bandcamp when the volume of sales is small.
Advantages of ditching Wordpress
music labore sunt in quis in non aute aliqua consectetur enim id ducimus voluptate tempor consequat eos fugiat deserunt nulla elit dolore fugiat praesentium esse laborum anim lorem incididunt reprehenderit deserunt do consectetur labore dolore aute ex nisi et mollit id est duis eiusmod non lorem veniam cupidatat pariatur praesentium cillumI’m thankful of the Wordpress ecosystem for allowing me to have a website for many years, but I’m thrilled I finally could escape its limitations. Combining several services has allowed me to have greater control of my online presence.
I no longer depend on a third-party theme, don’t have to deal with the Wordpress interface, and can separate the development from the deployment process.
Finally, decoupling services makes it easier to get back up running if I get hacked again.
music officia elit fugiat adipiscing cupidatat exercitation consequat laboris sint cillum aute velit do aliquip laboris occaecat ea exercitation irure dignissimos qui praesentium nostrud adipiscing praesentium commodo sint id pariatur dignissimos id excepteur aliqua laboris cillum exercitation cillum id praesentium aliquip fugiat fugiat eiusmod occaecat nulla dolor accusamus sit reprehenderit consequatThanks for reading! Visit my website and check out my new release www.rafartmusic.com