I wanted to write up the virtues of a very elegant open-source app, Typemill (https://typemill.net which is one of the simplest, most elegant text-focused CMS solutions I've found to date. It's a flat-file CMS that uses markdown at the back end; it's remarkably simple to set up and very fast in action.

For anyone who, like me, is heavily involved in writing/translating/publishing text, it's a fascinating solution, and also has an impressive security setup (you can restrict access to logged-in users only, so it's ideal for use as a small-team intranet/extranet) complete with multi-factor authentication.

It also allows you to publish books from selected (or all) pages, as PDF or ePub files. This is a highly unusual feature with which I haven't yet experimented. But Typemill is designed to handle thousands of pages (despite the lack of backend database), and the Better Search plugin is extremely powerful (only available to paying subscribers, but a basic subscription only costs EUR 22); even the basic search engine is good.

I've used it to set up a "hub", designed to collect together information on all kinds of socially responsible organisations and initiatives. Alas, I've realised that this well-intentioned project needs a database backend with filters, tagging, etc. – there's no point just creating a kind of enormous telephone directory. At the same time, I want to find an open-source solution rather than relying on the usual Big Tech solutions (or even on solutions like Notion). Ideas would be welcome!

In the meantime, to get a flavour of Typemill, by all means visit my proto-hub at https://www.myndhub.org

Cheers!
Bill