Cecil vs Sculpin
Cecil
cecil.appSculpin
sculpin.ioSide by side
| Figure | Cecil | Sculpin |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | Free | — |
| Free plan | Yes | — |
| Free trial | — | — |
| Open source | — | — |
| Web | — | Yes |
| Windows | Yes | — |
| macOS | Yes | — |
| Linux | Yes | Yes |
| Plans published | 1 | 0 |
| Spec score · Static site generators | 8.8 (#3) | 7.0 (#34) |
| Content | Content is stored in Markdown flat files with front matter. | Source files can include YAML front matter and be formatted with Twig and other formatters. |
| Content sources | markdown | markdown |
| Deployment | The maker documents deployment recipes for platforms including Netlify, Vercel, GitHub Pages, and GitLab Pages. | Generated production files can be uploaded to a web server, and the deployed site does not use PHP on the server. |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Installation | Cecil can be downloaded as a PHAR file and installed globally through Homebrew on macOS, Scoop on Windows, PHIVE, or a manual Linux command. | Sculpin can be installed as a dependency in a Composer-managed project with `composer require sculpin/sculpin`. |
| License | Cecil is free software distributed under the EUPL-1.2 license. | The Sculpin GitHub repository identifies the project as MIT licensed. |
| Local preview server | Yes | Yes |
| Supported languages | PHP | PHP |
| Templates | Cecil uses the Twig template engine and supports themes. | Sculpin uses Twig, which the maker describes as an extensible template engine. |
| What it does | Cecil is a PHP command-line static site generator that combines Markdown pages, media, and Twig templates to generate static websites. | Sculpin is a PHP static site generator that converts Markdown files, Twig templates, and standard HTML into static HTML sites. |
Plans
In their own words
Cecil
Cecil is a free command-line PHP application that generates static websites from Markdown pages, media, and Twig templates. It stores content in Markdown files with front matter and supports themes for changing site design. The generator can create pagination, sitemaps, redirects, robots.txt, taxonomies, RSS, and SEO metadata such as Open Graph tags, Twitter cards, and structured data. It can also produce responsive WebP and AVIF images and compress them. Multilingual content and template translation are supported, as is a local preview server. Cecil generates static HTML; its maker says site visits do not require a database or server-side script execution. Installation is documented for macOS, Windows, and Linux, but PHP 8.2 or later is required. Deployment recipes cover services including Netlify, Vercel, GitHub Pages, and GitLab Pages. The project is distributed under the EUPL-1.2 license and maintained by Arnaud Ligny. Cecil is free software at free, with no cost or usage limits stated.