How can you show off your programming skills with a personal website?

For someone like students, or a freelancer who don't want to spend a lot of money on buying domains or hosting. There a lot of hosting websites present for free for the same purpose. The only disadvantage here is, you won't have the full liberty in choosing the domain name, but getting something for free, without having the risk factor is a good deal, I believe. Some of the websites are: 1. GitHub 2. Vercel 3. Netlify There are other websites like these, you are just a google away.

If you are a beginner, you can go for GitHub pages, they are hosted for free, and right from your GitHub repository! So you get to show off the code of the portfolio and the portfolio itself. Do not worry a lot about the domain name, since at the start, the recruiters care more about what you have done, rather than what name your portfolio is hosted on

As a thumb rule, try your level best to go for a .com domain, as that is the most widely recognized extension out there! Also, try to avoid special characters within the domain name such as hyphens and underscores, as people often forget to put those in and it hurts discoverability.

Keep it simple. Remember this is your public facing self. So be professional but let some personality shine through. You may be snarky and clever in your personal life and I'm sure that serves you really well; but, employers don't know you yet, so take it down a notch. The classic [Your Name].dev never disappoints. Next, keep it cheap. Don't shell out big bucks for a domain thinking that it will have any return on investment, it probably won't. Most if not all the big name providers will have options that are easy to snatch up on the cheap. Finally, might as well keep it all together. If you are deploying on Vercel, get your domain from Vercel, especially if the prices align with any of the other providers.

Domain name is important especially for the students (initially for their own name) who would like to gain visibility and to proceed in their careers ahead. Two of the programs which I was part of, helped me in various resources, for example, receiving a free domain name for a year getting more than $100 cloud resources and other benefits: - Microsoft Learn Student Ambassador - GitHub Student Developer Pack There's also about Google developers and others but I do not have much knowledge about other programs. Other than that, you can host the websites for free utilizing GitHub pages, Vercel, Netlify and others as mentioned by @Alok Kumar.

In many cases, a static website is more than good enough for a portfolio website or even a blog. Popular frameworks to create static websites are Jekyll, Hugo or 11ty. You can host them for free on GitHub pages and even connect them with your domain name.

For the beginners Netlify is best option for quickly deploy their projects, it offers customize site name with https protocol which is good enough and the best thing of Netlify is they provide modern CI/CD infrastructure for frontend with using GitHub for deployment

For hosting a static website, I recommend using a service like Netlify or GitHub Pages. These platforms offer easy deployment, free hosting options, and support for custom domains. They also provide features like automatic builds, SSL certificates, and content delivery networks (CDNs) to ensure fast and reliable website performance.

You can often get a a domain name and hosting from the same service. This can save you some trouble if you're not familiar with setting up DNS.

Having control of your code allows for greater customization & in-depth insights, making it ideal for personalized products. For those without a tech background or team, no-code platforms like WebFlow, WordPress, and Wix offer a quick start. Personally, I prefer using popular web frameworks like Angular and Next.js to create web apps. You can use Jira to plan your project pipelines. Git for collaboration of project code with your team.

Try to pick a framework that you are familiar with and want to show off your skills on. While a static site might be great for a portfolio, why not create something with bells and whistles that shows people who know what you are made of. Sure, my portfolio site does not need to be fully WCAG compliant with a accessibility panel or have login functionality, but you should always be marketing your skills by showing your work. Best believe, if I was a UI/UX designer my portfolio would have slick transitions and clean eye-catching design.

Picking a framework totally depends on the time and skills that you have. Here is what i would suggest. 1. For beginners and simple UI - Use Hugo built in templates. Hugo is the fastest static site generator out there. 2. If you know HTML, CSS and JS build your own using CSS frameworks like Bootstrap, Bulma.io or Materialize. 3. If you know React and need advanced interactions, use Astro and Tailwind. Try to comeback to you website once every year and improve it with your new found skills.

Consider using Jekyll, a static site generator, for your personal website. It's simple to set up, works well with version control (like Git), and is easy to host on platforms like GitHub Pages or Netlify. Jekyll allows you to focus on content creation and offers themes and plugins to customize your site's appearance and functionality. Its simplicity and flexibility make it an excellent choice for a personal website that showcases your skills and content.

The best personal websites I have seen are the ones that are interactive. Some people turn their website into a game or add easter eggs or humorous comments in code for visitors who dig deeper into your projects. Not only is it fun, but adding animations/interactive elements showcases your creativity and web development abilities. This website itself is a project, so make it as entertaining as possible!

In this tech climate where it's hard to get entry jobs - a bonus way to help you stand out is to have a portfolio where you can showcase your project. Another tip I like sharing is that you don't need to pay a lot to maintain your portfolio; GitHub offers developer-friendly sites where you can showcase your project. In addition, having an active GitHub where you contribute to your project also helps a lot as it helps you stand out, especially in this incredible new competitive field. Finally, participate in open-source contribution; I know this might sound tough, but contact the maintainers and see how you can contribute. Or, if you are a student, start your project and ask your classmate to contribute and pick maintainers.

In my opinion, if the purpose is to show off your programming skills, the primary job of your website is to advertise and link to your live, functioning projects as well as the code that you wrote to produce them. The *actual* content on your main website doesn't need to be complex. One caveat to this is, maybe, if you're a UI developer and want to showcase some skills directly on your main website.

To effectively showcase your projects on your personal website, create a dedicated portfolio section where you provide concise descriptions and include images or screenshots of each project. Include links to live demos or GitHub repositories, and highlight your role and the technologies used in each project. Organize the portfolio logically, demonstrating a diverse range of work to showcase your skills and expertise to potential employers or clients.

To optimize your personal website, make it better in simple terms: 1. Speed: Ensure your site loads quickly by compressing images and using efficient code. 2. Mobile-Friendly: Make it work well on phones and tablets. 3. Good Content: Provide valuable and well-organized information. 4. SEO: Help people find your site on search engines by using relevant keywords. 5. Secure: Keep it safe from hackers with strong passwords and security plugins. 6. Regular Updates: Add new content and fix issues to keep it fresh and functional.

Many of the things that improve SEO for a website are also just good web development practices, for example making your website fast, accessible, secure, mobile-friendly, using semantic HTML, and deferring non-critical Javascript to run after the page body has loaded. You can use several free tools to check for issues in these areas, including Google Search Console (which has a built-in mobile-friendly test), Page Speed Insights, and Semrush. You can set up a site audit in Semrush to catch on-page and technical SEO issues as they arise then fix them in priority order. By following these best practices and with proactive monitoring, many more visitors will find and love the website you worked so hard to build.

If you want to consider something more convenient in respect of accessibility, please consider incorporating PWA in your web projects. PWA stands for Progressive Web Applications, which enables your website to be downloaded as an app in a mobile phone, and people can conveniently access your website without having to type in the URL in the browser again, and again.

Consider promoting something on your site, rather than the site itself. Unless you are posting somewhere dedicated to this, a bare link to your website without further context doesn't give people much reason to visit, and it could be considered spam. It's often better to share something interesting on your site, such as an interactive feature, a tool, or even just a blog post.

People like offerings, and you can leverage that point, and think about something which you could offer on your website. It could be anything, but a great start would be to have something unique. It could be any existing thing presented in a unique way, that people are compelled to visit you website, to having a website offering unique features, services or may be benefits! Be your own craftsman!

An example I've seen is the 40 enrollments for my Angular & Flutter Course in 15 minutes with my one post on Linkedin and that's just the beginning. LinkedIn is a powerful platform to promote as you can target your users and network with them professionally. Create content that suits your niche and promote your website or offerings through your content. Provide some value and users feel that. They connect. If you have the budget, you can leverage LinkedIn ads as well to boost things up. Also, the newsletter is a way to connect with your users on a weekly basis if your schedule is busy. Provide valuable things through the newsletter on Weekends and promote your website offerings through it.

A personal website is a great way to show off coding skills. But to truly stand out, we need to think bigger than just basic apps. I've seen many developers highlight simple CRUD projects. To make a real impact, build and deploy projects that tackle real problems. Invite people to use them. When real users interact with what you've built, it shows you can do more than just code – you can create solutions people value. Having users on your projects isn't just about showing off; it proves you're ready for real-world challenges.

I would say these days would require only a one-page site with all the links which generally should have your GitHub and LinkedIn link. Every HR person would look for these two and your contact information must be there so that if they like to add you in their contacts and they would ping you. Why one page website? Cause you are representing yourself and it should hold 1. Links 2. About 3. Contact Us Lesser the information but engaging one can work in landing a good job or connection anywhere!!