I recently used 11ty and nunjucks to develop a portfolio website for a friend of mine and let's just say things weren't as smooth as butter.

Let me start by saying that 11ty isn't inherently bad. In fact, it boasts simplicity and flexibility as its main selling points. However, as I delved deeper into my project, I stumbled upon some roadblocks that left me scratching my head and yearning for a smoother experience.

One of the first hurdles I encountered was the lack of comprehensive documentation. Sure, there are tutorials and guides available, but when it comes to troubleshooting specific issues or implementing more advanced features, I found myself scouring the web for answers to no avail. This lack of thorough documentation made the learning curve steeper than I anticipated and hindered my progress.

Another pain point I faced was the limited ecosystem surrounding 11ty. Unlike other popular static site generators like Gatsby or Hugo, 11ty doesn't enjoy a robust ecosystem of plugins and extensions. This meant that I had to rely on custom solutions or resort to cumbersome workarounds to achieve the functionality I needed. It felt like reinventing the wheel at times, which was both time-consuming and frustrating.

Despite the frustrations I encountered while using 11ty, there was one aspect of the framework that I genuinely enjoyed: its performance. Thanks to its minimalist approach and focus on generating static HTML files, 11ty delivered lightning-fast load times and snappy navigation for my website. This performance boost not only enhanced the user experience but also made me appreciate the efficiency and elegance of 11ty's core architecture. It's a testament to the power of simplicity in web development and served as a reminder that sometimes less is indeed more.

Overall, my experience with 11ty left me feeling underwhelmed and somewhat disappointed. While I appreciate its simplicity and the freedom it affords developers, its shortcomings in documentation, ecosystem, and convenience ultimately outweighed its benefits for me.