Here’s the Deal

DocPad vs Grav

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When comparing DocPad vs Grav, the Slant community recommends DocPad for most people. In the question“What are the best static site generators?” DocPad is ranked 6th while Grav is ranked 17th. The most important reason people chose DocPad is:

DocPad is published as an NPM module which makes it easy to integrate with an existing Node.js deployment.

Specs

LanguageCoffeeScript

LanguagesPHP

LicenseMIT

Markup LanguagesMarkdown

Multi Language SupportYes

Template EngineTwig

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Common Questions

What are the best static site generators?

Pros

Pro
Built on Node

DocPad is published as an NPM module which makes it easy to integrate with an existing Node.js deployment.

Pro
Has an active plug-in ecosystem

DocPad's has a large amount of plug-ins available to extend its functionality and compatibility with other language preprocessors and markup languages.

Javascript preprocessors include: Coffescript, TypeScript, and LiveScript.
CSS preprocessors include: LESS, SASS, Stylus, and Roole
HTML markups include: Markdown, and Textile
Templating engines include: Eco, Handlebars, Moustache, HAML, CoffeeKup, Jade, and Teacup
JSON converters include: YAML and CSON

Pro
Has Live Reload

DocPad has a Live Reload plug-in that leverages websockets to automatically update the blog content for users live on the site.

Pro
Built on top of the Express framework

Although DocPad is a static site generator, if you find the need to, you can extend the site with the Express framework for dynamic content as well.

Pro
Has graphical admin interfaces for managing your blog

There are multiple custom interfaces, including miniCMS available to DocPad which provide WYSIWYG editing and article management.

Pro
Easy to deploy

Deployment plug-ins make deploying to hosting providers even easier, with plug-ins for GitHub Pages, AWS, and Google Storage.

Pro
MIT-licensed

Pro
Prebuilt Skeletons

Skeletons are boilerplate setups to provide a baseline structure for you to fill content into.

Pro
Document and file querying with Query Engine

DocPad leverages Query Engine to provide a query API for querying files.

Pro
Can be hosted with any provider

Since Grav is built with PHP, it can be hosted on almost all web hosting providers. If the provider supports Wordpress, they also support Grav.

Pro
Easy creation of templates and content

Supports Twig for templating with Parsedown for fast Markdown and Markdown Extra support.

Pro
Easy to use admin panel

Well designed, easily usable and modern admin panel is a boost as it lets Clients edit the content easily.

Pro
Custom fields for content

YAML-based page headers allow you easily add custom dynamic fields to your content.

Pro
Open-source and free

Pro
Extensive Documentation

Documentation is not an afterthought! Grav has a dedicated documentation site plus loads of tutorials and guides.

Pro
Extensive documentation

Documentation is not an afterthought. Grav has a dedicated documentation site plus loads of tutorials and guides.

Pro
Built-in package manager

Pro
CLI Tools

Command line tools such as dependency installation, cache clearing, user creation, and backups.

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Cons

Con
Support for Handlebars templates is not mature - integration is awkward

Handlebars' philosophy of "no logic in templates" makes some things difficult:

DocPad built-in template helpers aren't available by default - they have to be manually added/exposed
DocPad's example template code often includes logic, which makes it impossible to use within Handlebars templates -- it has to be abstracted into custom helper functions.
Can't pass objects to function calls from within HB templates.

Con
More up-front investment to learn/use well

DocPad provides a LOT of extensibility and dynamic capability, which means there's more up-front investment to learn DocPad well -- and deviating from the defaults while maintaining project robustness may be difficult.