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Article Page
Long-form reading with metadata, text size controls, sharing, and related articles.
Install
Composes
- article-page.tsx18
- author-card.tsx2
- share-menu.tsx6
Accessibility4 checks
- The page is an article named by its h1 title. Related reading is a complementary region named by its h2.
- Text size is an APG radio group: one tab stop, arrow keys, Home, and End move and select. Each option has a spoken name.
- Sharing is a Share Menu: a menu button with arrow-key navigation, Escape to close, and a status message after copying.
- Reading size changes the type in the content only, so the layout and controls stay where readers left them.
Engineering · Build performance
How we cut cold builds from 41 seconds to 9
Kiln 4.2 caches parsed templates on disk and skips image work that has not changed. Here is what we measured, what we threw away, and what is still slow.
Ines Moreau
8 min read
A cold build is the first build after cloning a site or clearing the cache. For a 2,400-page documentation site, Kiln 4.1 spent 41 seconds there, and most of it was work we had already done on the previous machine.
Where the time went
Profiling twelve large sites showed the same shape: 58% of the time parsing templates, 27% resizing images, and the rest writing files. Template parsing was the surprise. The same 140 partials were parsed again for every page that used them.
We assumed images were the problem because they were the loudest part of the log.
What changed in 4.2
- Parsed templates are stored in the cache, keyed by their content hash.
- Images are only resized when the source or the requested size changes.
- Pages write in parallel, up to the number of available cores.
On the same site, a cold build now takes 9 seconds and a warm build takes under 2. Read the cache guide to share the cache between CI runs.
Code example
usage.tsx"use client";import { ArticlePage, ArticlePageAuthor, ArticlePageCategory, ArticlePageContent, ArticlePageDescription, ArticlePageDetails, ArticlePageHeader, ArticlePageMeta, ArticlePageRelated, ArticlePageRelatedItem, ArticlePageRelatedList, ArticlePageRelatedMeta, ArticlePageRelatedTitle, ArticlePageShare, ArticlePageTextSizeControl, ArticlePageTextSizeOption, ArticlePageTitle, ArticlePageToolbar, type ArticlePageVariant,} from "@/components/uai/article-page";import { AuthorCardAvatar, AuthorCardName } from "@/components/ui/uai/author-card";import { ShareMenuChannel, ShareMenuContent, ShareMenuCopy, ShareMenuNative, ShareMenuSeparator, ShareMenuTrigger,} from "@/components/ui/uai/share-menu";export function ArticlePagePreview({ variant = "centered" }: { variant?: ArticlePageVariant }) { return ( <ArticlePage variant={variant}> <ArticlePageHeader> <ArticlePageCategory>Engineering · Build performance</ArticlePageCategory> <ArticlePageTitle>How we cut cold builds from 41 seconds to 9</ArticlePageTitle> <ArticlePageDescription> Kiln 4.2 caches parsed templates on disk and skips image work that has not changed. Here is what we measured, what we threw away, and what is still slow. </ArticlePageDescription> <ArticlePageMeta> <ArticlePageAuthor> <AuthorCardAvatar name="Ines Moreau" /> <AuthorCardName>Ines Moreau</AuthorCardName> <ArticlePageDetails> <time dateTime="2026-09-24">September 24, 2026</time> <span aria-hidden="true">·</span> <span>8 min read</span> </ArticlePageDetails> </ArticlePageAuthor> <ArticlePageToolbar> <ArticlePageTextSizeControl> <ArticlePageTextSizeOption value="small" aria-label="Small text"> A </ArticlePageTextSizeOption> <ArticlePageTextSizeOption value="default" aria-label="Default text"> A </ArticlePageTextSizeOption> <ArticlePageTextSizeOption value="large" aria-label="Large text"> A </ArticlePageTextSizeOption> </ArticlePageTextSizeControl> <ArticlePageShare url="https://kiln.example/blog/cold-builds" shareTitle="How we cut cold builds from 41 seconds to 9" > <ShareMenuTrigger /> <ShareMenuContent align="end"> <ShareMenuCopy /> <ShareMenuNative /> <ShareMenuSeparator /> <ShareMenuChannel href="https://mastodon.example/share?url=https%3A%2F%2Fkiln.example%2Fblog%2Fcold-builds"> Mastodon </ShareMenuChannel> <ShareMenuChannel href="mailto:?subject=Kiln%20cold%20builds&body=https%3A%2F%2Fkiln.example%2Fblog%2Fcold-builds"> Email </ShareMenuChannel> </ShareMenuContent> </ArticlePageShare> </ArticlePageToolbar> </ArticlePageMeta> </ArticlePageHeader> <ArticlePageContent> <p> A cold build is the first build after cloning a site or clearing the cache. For a 2,400-page documentation site, Kiln 4.1 spent 41 seconds there, and most of it was work we had already done on the previous machine. </p> <h2>Where the time went</h2> <p> Profiling twelve large sites showed the same shape: 58% of the time parsing templates, 27% resizing images, and the rest writing files. Template parsing was the surprise. The same 140 partials were parsed again for every page that used them. </p> <blockquote> We assumed images were the problem because they were the loudest part of the log. </blockquote> <h2>What changed in 4.2</h2> <ul> <li>Parsed templates are stored in the cache, keyed by their content hash.</li> <li>Images are only resized when the source or the requested size changes.</li> <li>Pages write in parallel, up to the number of available cores.</li> </ul> <p> On the same site, a cold build now takes 9 seconds and a warm build takes under 2. Read the <a href="#cache-guide">cache guide</a> to share the cache between CI runs. </p> </ArticlePageContent> <ArticlePageRelated> <ArticlePageRelatedTitle>Related reading</ArticlePageRelatedTitle> <ArticlePageRelatedList> <ArticlePageRelatedItem href="#incremental"> Incremental builds, explained <ArticlePageRelatedMeta>6 min read</ArticlePageRelatedMeta> </ArticlePageRelatedItem> <ArticlePageRelatedItem href="#ci-cache"> Sharing the build cache in CI <ArticlePageRelatedMeta>4 min read</ArticlePageRelatedMeta> </ArticlePageRelatedItem> <ArticlePageRelatedItem href="#release-4-2"> Kiln 4.2 release notes <ArticlePageRelatedMeta>Changelog</ArticlePageRelatedMeta> </ArticlePageRelatedItem> </ArticlePageRelatedList> </ArticlePageRelated> </ArticlePage> );}Manual installation
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