Personal branding theme for developers
While there have been plenty of portfolio platforms/templates for designers, there hadn't been a good solution for developers to showcase their stories. GitHub profiles are great, but not enough to show something more than just a code.
That's why in 2018 I and my friend Dawid decided to build "intro". The theme with content sections, that developers may use to show their skills, tools, and projects.
We launched it as a commercial project on ProductHunt. With near 350 upvotes, it generated some traffic & sales, as well as positive feedback from developers.
The theme was initially built in vanilla JavaScript and offered:
Built-in static HTML generator,
10 predefined color versions,
Simple configuration (entire content in JSON file),
Contact form with e-mail notifications.
In 2020 I've decided to rewrite it to Gatsby / React, and release it on MIT License.
Since then it has been downloaded +3.000 times and got +150 stars on GitHub.
Intro. has been also featured in the official Gatsby Newsletter and by @gatsbyjs Twitter account. Stackbit included the theme in the "10 of the Best Gatsby Themes" collection.
What have I learned?
Managing Open Source project - dealing with issues & pull requests, the importance of good documentation.
Developing Gatsby themes - using component shadowing technique, working with yarn workspaces, learning about Gatsby Community and contribution rules.
Building JS packages - publishing on npm, using semantic versioning.
Product marketing - how to launch & promote a product in the developers' community, on platforms like Product Hunt or catalogs like JamTemplates.
More info
2018
