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FAQ / Antikythera Support ​

Please find a composite of overarching questions regarding the development of Antikythera articles.

Do you have any server requirements or stack requirements for the article website? ​

Antikythera articles are deployed via Netlify, and prioritize javascript frameworks. Past articles have used React/Nextjs, Vue/Nuxt, and Eleventy. If you are interested in using a different framework, please reach out to see if we have an boilerplate available. If you have already installed the API via a undocumented framework and would like to add to the API documentation, please let us know!

INFO

Please note that the Antikythera API layer is instantiated on the client side. Netlify supports static sites, SPAs, and SSR apps.

How do we store/share the code for the site (and connect it to the hosting provider)? ​

We use Netlify for our deployment. Netlify supports Github (our preference), Gitlab, and Bitbucket for automatic deployment.

How can we access the antikythera API and query its database for content? ​

The antikythera API is accessible via the npm registry via the @antikythera/antikythera npm package.

Where does the black overlay box come from? ​

The Antikythera Annotation Menu Component is a custom HTML element available via the @antikythera/antikythera api. Once initialized with the proper article ID, the its data is sourced via the API.

INFO

The theme of the Menu Component can be customized (dark and light are currently available).

How is SEO configured? ​

SEO meta tag and Open Graph tag configuration is the responsibility of the team building the article’s site. The API is client-side, tag configuration should avoid sourcing content directly from the API.

Does the API add the annotation highlighting or does the developer add the highlight? ​

The Antikythera API automatically wraps annotations in a span element with the .annotation class. The .annotation class has embedded css styling. If you would like to set up a custom class with custom styling, please refer to the init method’s annotationClass parameter.

Are the annotations fetched each time? And how will the annotations be updated after the article is released? ​

Annotations are added by the Antikythera team via their Admin panel. Annotations can be added upon and after article release. The Antikythera API has two methods for adding annotations:

  1. (Recommended) The API has the capability to automatically comb the article’s text nodes for matching strings. The API will wrap these annotations in the proper span elements dynamically and inject the proper interactions. This is an asynchronous client-side process, and allows Antikythera to add annotations to articles after release without redeploying the article.
  2. Annotations can also be manually set by wrapping annotated words in a span with the class .annotation and the respective annotation ID (provided by the Antikythera team). These annotations are permanently part of the article until manually removed by a developer. This method acts as a safeguard for articles that require more nuanced intervention due to complex css styling or unanticipated javascript logic.

Do we want designers to have their own staging website or using antikythera’s hosting? ​

Designers can use their own staging site for development. However, the article’s production site will be hosted on Antikythera’s Netlify account.

Don't see your question here? ​

Please don't hesitate to reach out to our team to seek clarification.