When creating the C-FLEX project website, we put a lot of thought into choosing the right technology to match our values of sustainability and efficiency. After exploring different options, we landed on building a static website using the HUGO framework. This choice helps us reduce infrastructure demands and create a solution that’s built to last.

What Makes Static Websites Special?

A static website is made up of pre-built HTML, CSS, and JavaScript files that are delivered to users as-is. Unlike dynamic websites that need server-side processing and database queries to generate content, static sites skip all that and directly serve files. By using Content Delivery Networks (CDNs), they can scale globally and provide fast load times.

This simplicity offers several advantages:

• Faster performance since no processing happens on the server.
• Fewer resources needed, which means lower costs and less energy consumption.
• Better security because there’s no database or server-side code that could be exploited.
• With a static setup, everything is ready to go at the moment of deployment, making it a robust and efficient solution.

Why Static Websites Are a Perfect Fit for C-FLEX

For C-FLEX, we wanted a lightweight website that consumes as few resources as possible and remains reliable over time. By avoiding complex server setups and databases, we ensure that the website is future-proof. If dependencies or technologies change, the core functionality of the site will remain intact.

Static websites also excel at caching. Since our content doesn’t change frequently, browsers can store pages locally for extended periods. This reduces server load and improves loading speeds for users.

To make the site even more resilient, we included all necessary assets—like css, Bootstrap, fonts, JavaScript, images, and documents—within the project. This ensures the site can operate independently, even without internet access or external services. (except for videos: for the moment we rely on YouTube)

Why HUGO?

HUGO stood out as the ideal tool for building our website. It’s incredibly fast and efficient, thanks to its foundation in Go, a compiled programming language. HUGO’s speed and ease of use allowed us to focus on creating a polished site without getting bogged down in technical complexity.

Using HUGO also supports collaboration. All the site content is written in markdown, making it easy for team members to contribute and edit. Its strong templating system lets us break the code into reusable components, ensuring a consistent design and speeding up the development process.

By choosing HUGO, we aligned the website with C-FLEX’s goals of efficiency, simplicity, and sustainability. The result is a platform that’s easy to maintain, performs well, and is ready to stand the test of time.