Welcome to Érable

About Érable

This section provides an overview of what this is and what does this do.

Notice that this is the main content. There is a vertical line in the right going from the start to the end of the main content.

Érable is "Yet Another Semantic HTML Minimalistic CSS" (YASHTMLMCSS, or YASHMC for besties). This serves the purpose of effortlessly outputting a nice layout for a simple website.

The point of this tool (or this css file) existing is to provide an extremely lightweight stylesheet for blazing fast websites, while at the same time keeping an aesthetic of the good ol' days of the Internet.

Now, WHY WOULD THIS EXIST, FOR FUCKS' SAKE? (Keep reading)

My name is Giovani, and I am a fullstack (backend that needs to get paid) programmer. I learned React and many other tools just so I could build state-of-the-art websites in today's dynamic world.

As any dev that came from C++ roots, I hate the current webstack. And I say this being a huge fan of web applications! Why do I need fancy stateful websites with hydration and optimized rendering everytime? Sometimes all we need is a good structured website that is easy to build and easy to read; that works well with SEO and gets the job done.

A website built directly in HTML with good semantics has lots of benefits:

1. It loads fast
2. Easy to build
3. It feels more personal
4. Great for accessibility
5. Gives a great feeling of nostalgia
6. It actually makes you feel superior
7. Ok, I am joking about the last one
8. Maybe

Now, of course, there are plenty of other similar (I am lying, this is actually scarcer than I thought) frameworks out there, like Pico, that works fine. So why should I use Érable?

First, to say that you should use it, I won't.

This is something to inspire the growth of a movement for a more democratic and personal Internet.

In the last months (as of Oct. 1st, 2025) I've seen many people online talking about two things:

1. Linux (and open source software)
2. A more democratic and personal Internet

and this is ACTUALLY HUGE. We may be witnessing a huge shift in the biggest communitary space on Earth (the Internet, if you didn't get it).

I heavily recommend that you watch the videos anchored above (I know that YouTube kinda sucks for most people nowadays, but it's worth it).

Basically the message we want to spread is: the Internet is not some place to just consume stuff that big corporations build so they can make a huge profit while you rot your brain;

THE INTERNET IS A PLACE WHERE YOU CAN BUILD AND SHARE YOUR OWN WORLD, FOR FREE, WITH ANYONE. And then, logically, connect with other people who do the same.

... and Érable is a small CSS file that can help you build a simple but pleasing blog, portfolio page, or whatever the you want.

Érable is here to help as it can to make using HTML more democratic and pleasing, without the need to worry about centering a div (btw, just use display flex with justify and align).

Tutorial