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WE3 Lab Website — Editing Guide

All routine content updates are made by editing JSON files in the content/ folder and running the build scripts. The site is rebuilt automatically by GitHub Actions every Sunday at 6 pm PT, or you can trigger it manually.

Table of Contents

Triggering a rebuild manually

Option 1 — GitHub Actions: Go to Actions → Update Site → Run workflow in the GitHub repository.

Option 2 — Local: Run all build scripts from the repo root:

python3 scripts/build_home_page.py
python3 scripts/build_research_page.py
python3 scripts/build_research_subpages.py
python3 scripts/build_people_page.py

Site structure overview

Page URL Description
Home index.html Landing page with lab mission, research areas, and news strip
Who We Are people.html Lab members grid; links to individual profile pages
Member profiles people/{Name}.html Auto-generated profile pages
What We Do work.html Landing page with Research and Teaching boxes
Research research-areas.html Research areas, Previous Research, Dissertations strip
Research sub-pages research/{area}.html Per-area page with overview, projects, publications
Teaching teaching.html Course cards
Why We Do It stories.html Lab stories page
Contact contact.html Contact form and info

Content folder overview

All content you manually edit lives in content/:

File Controls
content/members/members.json Active lab members (all roles except alumni)
content/members/meagan.json PI profile — bio, education, title, links
content/members/alumni.json Alumni
content/members/images/ Member headshots
content/news/news.json Front-page news strip
content/projects/projects.json Lab projects
content/publications/publications.json Lab publications
content/research_areas/research_areas.json Research areas (name, description, overview, image)
content/research_areas/ (images) Research area banner images
content/teaching/teaching.json Courses taught by group
content/dissertations/dissertations.json dissertation defenses

Adding a new group member

  1. Add a headshot to content/members/images/ named {FirstLast}.png (PascalCase, no spaces, no "Dr." — e.g. JaneSmith.png). Crop to a square; 400×400 px is ideal.

  2. Add an entry to content/members/members.json:

{
  "name": "Jane Smith",
  "netID": "jsmith",
  "email": "jsmith@stanford.edu",
  "role": "phd student",
  "bio": "One or two sentences about Jane's research focus.",
  "research_areas": ["separations", "infrastructure planning"],
  "scholar_url": "https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=XXXXXXXXX",
  "linkedin": "https://www.linkedin.com/in/janesmith/",
  "website": "",
  "cv": ""
}

Valid roles: postdoc · phd student · ms student · undergrad · staff · staff scientist · research engineer

The roles staff, staff scientist, and research engineer all appear under the Research Staff section. The card label will reflect the specific role (e.g. "Staff Scientist", "Research Engineer").

Valid research_areas IDs (must match id fields in research_areas.json): separations · energy flexibility · infrastructure planning · water energy food policies

  1. Run build_people_page.py. This regenerates people.html and creates a profile page at people/JaneSmith.html.

Moving a group member to alumni

  1. Remove the person's entry from content/members/members.json.
  2. Add an entry to content/members/alumni.json:
{
  "name": "Jane Smith",
  "degree_year": "PhD 2025",
  "placement": "Assistant Professor, MIT",
  "scholar_url": "https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=XXXXXXXXX",
  "linkedin": "https://www.linkedin.com/in/janesmith/"
}
  1. Run build_people_page.py. The person will move from the active members grid to the Alumni section, and their profile page will no longer be generated.

Adding a news item

Edit content/news/news.json and prepend a new entry (most recent first):

{
  "date": "June 2026",
  "headline": "Paper accepted at Nature Water",
  "organization": "Nature Portfolio",
  "link": "https://doi.org/10.XXXX/XXXXX"
}

Run build_home_page.py to update the front page news strip.

Adding a project

  1. (Optional) Add a project image to content/projects/images/.

  2. Add an entry to content/projects/projects.json:

{
  "id": "unique-project-id",
  "title": "Project Title",
  "team": ["netid1", "netid2"],
  "description": "Long-form description of the project.",
  "research_areas": ["separations", "infrastructure planning"],
  "image": "content/projects/images/myproject.jpg",
  "funding": ["NSF CBET Award #XXXXXXX"],
  "links": [
    { "label": "Web Application", "url": "https://example.com" },
    { "label": "GitHub", "url": "https://github.com/we3lab/repo" }
  ]
}
  • team: list of netID values from members.json — headshots and profile links are resolved automatically.
  • research_areas: list of area id values from research_areas.json — determines which research sub-pages show this project.
  • funding: list of funding source strings displayed as a bulleted "Supported By" list.
  1. Run build_research_subpages.py and build_people_page.py.

Adding a publication

Add an entry to content/publications/publications.json:

{
  "title": "Full Publication Title",
  "authors": "Smith, J., Adkins, C., & Mauter, M. S.",
  "journal": "Environmental Science & Technology",
  "year": 2025,
  "doi": "10.1021/acs.est.5c00001",
  "research_areas": ["separations"],
  "team": ["cadkins"]
}
  • doi: DOI without the https://doi.org/ prefix. Used to build the clickable link on the card.
  • research_areas: list of area id values — determines which research sub-pages list this publication.
  • team: list of netID values — determines which member profile pages list this publication.

Run build_research_subpages.py and build_people_page.py.

Modifying a research area

Edit content/research_areas/research_areas.json. Each entry has:

{
  "id": "separations",
  "name": "Separations Process Modeling & Design",
  "label": "Separations",
  "file": "research/separations.html",
  "active": true,
  "image": "content/research_areas/reverse_osmosis.jpg",
  "description": "Short description shown on cards.",
  "overview": [
    "First paragraph of the Research Overview section.",
    "Second paragraph."
  ],
  "archive_note": ""
}
  • active: true — area appears in the main Research grid and the home page diamond.
  • active: false — area appears in the "Previous Research" section with an archive note box.
  • archive_note — message shown in the amber warning box on inactive area pages.
  • label — short name used in the "What We Do" nav dropdown.

To add a new research area:

  1. Add an entry to research_areas.json with a unique id and a file path (e.g. research/newarea.html).
  2. Place a banner image in content/research_areas/.
  3. Run build_research_page.py (updates the Research page) and build_research_subpages.py (creates the sub-page).
  4. Add "What We Do" nav dropdown entries to all HTML files and build script templates — search for research-areas.html to find all locations.

Run all build scripts after any change to research_areas.json.

Adding a course

Add an entry to content/teaching/teaching.json:

{
  "course_code": "CEE 273X",
  "name": "Course Title",
  "quarters": ["Autumn 2026"],
  "description": "Brief course description.",
  "link": "https://explorecourses.stanford.edu/..."
}
  • quarters: array of strings — each renders as a pill tag on the card.
  • link: optional URL to the course listing or syllabus.

Run build_research_page.py to update the Teaching page.

Adding a dissertation

Add an entry to content/dissertations/dissertations.json:

{
  "title": "Full Dissertation Title",
  "name": "Graduate Student Full Name",
  "date": "May 26, 2026",
  "link": "https://youtu.be/XXXXXXXXXXX"
}
  • title: full dissertation title. Can be left empty ("") if not yet available.
  • name: graduate's full name as it should appear on the card.
  • date: defense date in any readable format — "May 26, 2026", "June 2026", etc. Entries are sorted most-recent-first automatically.
  • link: YouTube URL of the defense recording (upload as Unlisted). The video will be embedded directly on the page with a copy-link button. Leave empty ("") if no recording is available.

Run build_research_page.py to update the Dissertations strip on the Research page.

How the automation works

Content file Pages rebuilt Script
content/news/news.json index.html build_home_page.py
content/research_areas/research_areas.json index.html, research-areas.html, teaching.html build_home_page.py, build_research_page.py
content/teaching/teaching.json teaching.html build_research_page.py
content/dissertations/dissertations.json research-areas.html build_research_page.py
content/research_areas/research_areas.json research/*.html sub-pages build_research_subpages.py
content/projects/projects.json research/*.html, people/*.html build_research_subpages.py, build_people_page.py
content/publications/publications.json research/*.html, people/*.html build_research_subpages.py, build_people_page.py
content/members/members.json people.html, people/*.html build_people_page.py
content/members/alumni.json people.html build_people_page.py
content/members/meagan.json people.html build_people_page.py

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