Publishing and builds

Superlite generates static HTML files when content or site wide settings are published.

This means visitors do not normally load pages through the CMS. They receive already generated HTML files from the web server.

Most publishing happens automatically when you work in Superlite, but you can also rebuild the entire public website manually when necessary.

Publishing a page

Open a page in the Superlite editor.

The publishing panel shows the current status of the page and contains two actions:

• Publish
• Save draft

Choose Publish when you want the current version in the editor to become the public version of the page.

Superlite generates the public HTML and makes it available at the page URL.

Saving a draft

Choose Save draft when you want to save your work without publishing those changes.

For a new page, this allows you to continue working on the content before making it public.

You can return to the page later, continue editing and publish it when it is ready.

Editing an already published page

A published page can also have unpublished changes.

Open the page, make your changes and choose Save draft.

The changes are saved in Superlite, while visitors continue to see the currently published version.

When the changes are ready, choose Publish.

Superlite then generates the new public version.

This allows you to work on an existing page without exposing unfinished changes.

Page status

The publishing panel shows whether the page is currently Draft or Published.

A draft does not have a normal public version.

A published page has a generated HTML version available on the website.

Published pages also have a View page option in the editor so you can open the current public page in a new browser tab.

Publishing URL changes

The URL slug is shown in the publishing panel.

For example:

/about-us/

You can change the slug while editing the page.

The public URL does not change simply because you edit the slug. The new URL is used when you publish the page.

If the page is already published, Superlite also shows:

Create a 301 if the URL changes

This option is enabled by default.

Leave it enabled when you want visitors using the previous URL to be redirected permanently to the new one.

What Superlite builds

When you publish a page, Superlite generates the HTML required for the public version.

It uses:

• The published page content
• Page settings
• SEO and social settings
• Site settings
• Navigation
• The active theme
• Relevant active modules

Superlite also updates sitemap.xml and robots.txt where required.

The result is the static public website served to visitors.

Publishing the homepage

The homepage is selected under:

Settings → Publishing

Only published pages can be selected as the homepage.

Choose the page you want to use and select:

Save settings and rebuild

The selected page is then generated at the root domain.

For example:

https://example.com/

When a page becomes the homepage, Superlite removes its separate slug version to avoid creating two public URLs with the same content.

You can also select No CMS page selected if you do not want a Superlite page assigned as the homepage.

Rebuilding after changing settings

Saving global Superlite settings uses the:

Save settings and rebuild

action.

Superlite saves the new settings and rebuilds the published pages so that the generated website uses the new configuration.

After the process finishes, Superlite reports how many published pages were rebuilt.

Rebuilding after changing theme

Changing the active theme can affect every public page.

When activating another installed theme, Superlite provides:

Activate and rebuild

Superlite activates the theme and regenerates the published website using it.

Your page content is not recreated or replaced. The existing content is rendered again using the newly selected theme.

Rebuilding the entire site manually

Superlite also provides a manual full site rebuild.

Open:

Tools → System

Under Site maintenance, choose:

Rebuild site

Superlite asks you to confirm that you want to rebuild the entire public site.

The rebuild generates every published page again using the current master data and active theme.

It also rebuilds:

• sitemap.xml
• robots.txt

When the rebuild is complete, Superlite reports how many published pages were rebuilt.

When to use Rebuild site

You normally do not need to rebuild the entire website after every page edit.

Publishing a page handles the required generation automatically.

A manual rebuild is useful when you want to make sure that all published pages have been regenerated from the current content, configuration and active theme.

For example, it can be useful after troubleshooting a site or after a change that may affect many generated pages.

Rebuilding does not change your content

Rebuild site does not rewrite your page content.

Superlite uses the content already stored in the CMS and generates new public files from it.

It does not turn drafts into published pages.

Only pages that are currently published are included in the public site rebuild.

Static public pages

Once a page has been successfully published or rebuilt, the resulting HTML exists independently of the administration interface.

A normal visitor requests that static file directly from the web server.

This is the central publishing model used by Superlite.

You use the CMS to manage and publish the website, while visitors use the generated website.