Can content be added without rebuilding in GatsbyJS on Netlify? Discussion of using Contentful and Sanity.io for triggering rebuilds and improving dev experience.

Hi, maybe this is a dumb question but I’m wondering if it is possible to add and update content without deploy/building? I’m using GatsbyJS to build my portfolio and hosting on netlify

Nope, you have to rebuild. You can use netlify deploy hooks so that anytime data is published it triggers a rebuild

With Contentful, there’s a way where you can choose what type of changes can only trigger a web hook. Is that what you’re looking for? Like only publish would deploy/build an app but not necessarily an update or create

Thank you for the answers!

Maybe we should make an example of a netlify function that makes it easy to selectively rebuild on content updates too. I mean, so that people don't need to recommend Contentful here 😛

And maybe a FAQ section? 🙂 Sanity is a great service but it can be a bit confusing to get started

Understandable! The reason we don't have a FAQ section is because we think it's better to structure that information into where it belongs in the documentation. In this case, what was unclear to you? How Gatsby worked as a static site generator? Or what choices you have in triggering a rebuild?

It was the choices to trigger a rebuild 🙂 I found the answer after I played a bit with the templates.
IMO, I think it is better to have an FAQ and link some of the answers to the specific parts in the documentation. Anyhow, I think Sanity is a great service

Gotcha! I'll make sure that we add some more material on hosting and rebuilding on Netlify/Vercel

Didn’t mean to recommend contentful! 😂 Just used it for referenced haha
Not trying to pander but I’ve been using Contentful for a year and I’m never starting a new project there after using Sanity for 2 weeks!

Dev and author experience is soooo much better.

Haha – no worries 🙌