homepage



Your  homepage  represents you on the web, typically at the top of your domain, with your name and an iconic representation, often marked up with h-card, and fairly commonly one or more streams of recent, topical, or most relevant posts marked up with h-entry.

For work on the IndieWeb.org homepage itself, see:
 * site-homepage

Why
All the reasons why and more.

Use your own personal domain to own your identity on the web.

By making your homepage more useful, you will feel more motivated to share your URL instead of just your Twitter handle or other social media profile.

How
What should be on your indie web site home page?

About You
Your homepage should have some basic information about you:
 * name
 * icon / profile photo
 * tagline / bio
 * communication links (aim: mailto: tel: etc. see for some UI brainstorming on this)
 * other about / contact information, e.g.
 * Links to silo profile URLs, approximate location, short bio, categories/tags
 * marked up with h-card (see Indiewebify.me to verify, validate)
 * web-sign-in support
 * rel-me links to your other identities on the web

Your home page is the URL you share with people, therefore it's useful to set it up with:
 * role - brief summary of what it is you do
 * discovery of what else you have on your site
 * Your local time
 * Last seen (last checkin/location post)
 * upcoming events
 * projects
 * disclosure - disclosures of various types, e.g. cookies or analytics tracking

Stream
Next, it's quite popular to have: See the Stream of Updates examples below for some inspiration.
 * stream of your most recent posts and other activities.

Archive Navigation
If you show a stream of recent posts on your home page, it may also be useful to show a small navigation interface for your archives.

More: archive navigation.

Previously
Among early 2000s bloggers it was popular to also have on your home page:
 * blogroll

Simple Homepages
Some interesting indieweb home page examples of simple contact/about information (e.g. hCard), maps for location, live IM status etc. - probably worth expanding and document each of these:
 * http://scottbullard.com/ - phone/email links with more: http://scottbullard.com/more.html
 * http://www.jaredhanson.net/ - live IM status on Jared's hCard
 * http://npdoty.name/ - map as background centered on his current location
 * old adactio.com (pre-2012)
 * http://jasonpark.me/ - made to look like graphically browsing a computer filesystem
 * https://jacky.wtf/
 * https://www.gwern.net/

That and most recent blog post:
 * http://ebdesign.se/

That and occasional blog posts:
 * http://aralbalkan.com/

The https://bear.im homepage for has a super simple hCard and then links to the hFeed and a more substantive About page

Stream of Updates
All that and most of the content they post online as a stream:

Mixed/composite feed examples with complete posts:
 * http://tantek.com/
 * http://adactio.com/ (late 2012+)
 * https://aaronparecki.com/ (2016+)

Streams of partial posts / summaries:
 * http://voxpelli.com/ – stream of latest blog post titles

Streams of only names/titles of posts:
 * https://bear.im/bearlog

Separate feeds:
 * http://voxpelli.com/ – links to separate feeds for bookmarks and social interactions
 * http://2015.aaronparecki.com/ (2012-2015)
 * https://jacky.wtf (2022+) - homepage links to articles (when present) and a small link-log

Homepage Brainstorming
Things which could go on homepages which aren’t currently implemented, or are underimplemented. Sometimes there is an intent to implement.


 * payment links/buttons
 * local weather/daylight (extra context)
 * people I’ve mentioned recently
 * tags I’ve used recently
 * actions like subscribe, contact, add to address book
 * latest comments
 * “live” banner image/gallery made from recent posts tagged with #banner or similar, to show off recent photo highlights without requiring a separate UI to manage it

I might be adding links to /me (my profile page) and /about (about the site, license info, powered by, hosted at, etc.) to my homepage. --Sandeep Shetty

Signed-in Features
When signed-in to your own site, it might be useful to have:
 * reader - integrated reader showing posts from others you follow
 * silo examples of such a logged in home page: Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr - logged in dashboard

It may also be interesting to change your homepage for visitors who have signed in (/and are in your contact list etc)
 * Showing replies, likes and other posts not usually shown on a homepage feed for signed-in viewers

Sketches
I did some homepage sketches/brainstorming here --Waterpigs.co.uk 14:32, 18 June 2013 (PDT)

Webmention to homepage
Webmentions sent directly to home pages could serve a number of use-cases:
 * notification of a person-mention (like an indieweb @-mention) on a post somewhere else
 * invitation to an indie event
 * notification of a new private message received
 * allowing other people to tag you in photos or posts

Silo Examples
Silos don't technically give you access to their home page, but they do typically provide you with something resembling a home page, albeit typically at a path (not at the root), and they call it a profile. Though they really should be providing subdomains instead of profile paths.

Twitter
As an example, Twitter let's you customize your profile page with:
 * icon - upload (min/max resolution/bytes?)
 * header image - upload (min/max resolution/bytes?)
 * bio - 160 character text field, @ and # auto-linked.
 * website - auto-linked URL
 * location - ??? character text field.

Articles
Articles and posts about homepage design and features:


 * 2013-12-04 Tantek Çelik : Toward A People Focused Mobile Communication Experience

Related Sessions

 * 2012/UK/Demos - specifically, General discussion / UX thoughts.