# CONTENT_STRATEGY.md

## 1. Voice & tone

| Attribute | Do | Don't |
|---|---|---|
| **Plain-spoken** | "I build and run web systems." | "Passionate technologist crafting digital experiences." |
| **Evidence-led** | "Replaced spreadsheet-driven reporting workflows for a UK county council." | "Extensive experience with stakeholders." |
| **Understated confidence** (Norwegian-market calibrated) | "Eight years building and maintaining production systems." | "Senior rockstar engineer." |
| **Honest** | "SQLite was the right call for a single-user app; I'd move to Postgres for multi-tenant." | Hiding limitations. |

**Seniority framing decision:** the site never self-labels "senior". Role line = **"Systems Developer"** (EN) / **"Systemutvikler"** (NO), qualified by "8+ years". Seniority is demonstrated through trade-off writing, security notes, and production thinking. This is honest against the CV ("mid-level, eight years"), safe in Norwegian culture, and *more* convincing to P2/P3 than a claimed title.

## 2. Hero copy (approved-draft level)

**EN**
> **Connor Babbington**
> Systems Developer — .NET, full-stack & infrastructure
> I design, build and run web systems: eight-plus years delivering internal software for UK local government, now building full-stack products in Norway.
> Chips: `Tønsberg, Norway` `Work permit ✓` `Open to remote / hybrid / on-site` `English native · Norsk B1`
> CTAs: **[View projects]** **[Download CV]**

**NO (written natively, not translated)**
> **Connor Babbington**
> Systemutvikler — .NET, fullstack og infrastruktur
> Jeg utvikler og drifter websystemer. Åtte års erfaring med fagsystemer i britisk offentlig sektor — nå bygger jeg fullstack-løsninger fra Tønsberg.
> Chips: `Bosatt i Tønsberg` `Gyldig oppholdstillatelse` `Åpen for remote / hybrid / oppmøte` `Engelsk morsmål · Norsk B1`
> CTAs: **[Se prosjekter]** **[Last ned CV]**

## 3. Section content rules

- **Skills:** grouped chips + one context line per group. Never percentage bars, never star ratings. Groups: *Development* (C#, .NET, Python, JavaScript/TypeScript, React, SQL) · *DevOps & Infrastructure* (Docker, Linux, CI/CD, Azure DevOps, nginx/reverse proxies, monitoring, self-hosting) · *Practices* (testing, security hardening, OAuth2 integrations, stakeholder communication, production support). Each chip must be defensible in an interview.
- **Experience:** the 2015–2023 Warwickshire role gets 3–4 highlight bullets (outcomes, not duties), with the 2015–2017 apprenticeship shown as *progression* on the timeline (apprentice → developer — a retention/growth signal, not a footnote). Non-dev roles (sales, bartender, receptionist — held alongside/before the council role) collapse into one line — "Earlier & alongside: customer-facing roles that shaped how I communicate" — present for timeline honesty, de-emphasised visually. NO version frames council work as "fagsystemer for lokalforvaltning". Canonical facts: see CANONICAL_CONTENT.md.
- **About:** 3 short paragraphs — (1) how I work, (2) the homelab/personal-projects habit as evidence of currency, (3) life in Norway + language journey + interests (games → strategic thinking framing kept light). Photo: the outdoor headshot (warm, approachable); the suit photo reserved for CV/LinkedIn.

## 4. Case-study content sources & angles

### JobTrack (`/projects/jobtrack`)
- **Source:** `D:\Job tracker\website_details.md` (already portfolio-shaped — reuse its headline, features, use cases) + README (stack: React, ASP.NET Core (.NET 9), SQLite, FastAPI summarizer, Ollama, Docker, PWA share-target).
- **Angle:** *product thinking + integration depth.* Story: "I had a real problem (job hunting), built a real tool, then hardened it like production software."
- **Decision candidates:** SQLite vs Postgres for single-user; local AI (Ollama) vs cloud API (privacy + cost); PWA share-target vs native app; no offline cache by design (deploy freshness) — this one is *gold*: a deliberate anti-feature with reasoning.
- **Security notes:** Google ID-token auth, ownership checks, secure file uploads.

### InboxIntel (`/projects/inboxintel`)
- **Source:** repo README + docs/ARCHITECTURE.md.
- **Angle:** *architecture discipline.* Story: "Clean Architecture in practice: four-layer .NET solution, background sync worker, safe-by-design destructive operations."
- **Decision candidates:** Clean Architecture layering & dependency rule; encrypted-at-rest OAuth refresh tokens (Data Protection API); preview-then-confirm for all destructive cleanup; advisory-only AI layer; Polly retry/backoff against Gmail API.
- **Honesty note:** README calls it a scaffold with marked extension points — the case study says "in active development" with a roadmap, and status chip `In development`. Never overclaim; P4 will probe.

### Homelab (`/projects/homelab`) — capability page, lighter template
- Ubuntu + Docker services, reverse proxy, auth, monitoring, self-hosted Gitea (git.cesnimda.uk — itself proof), backups. Angle: *operations competence* — "I don't just deploy; I keep things running." Include a small topology diagram.

### The site itself (footer meta-link)
- One short page/footnote: performance budget, accessibility choices, bilingual architecture. Written *after* implementation (Phase 3 content); designed now as a P2 hook.

## 5. Localisation strategy (content level)

1. **Write EN and NO as siblings, not source→target.** NO sentences should be shorter and plainer; Bokmål tolerates directness English pads out.
2. **Equivalence, not identity:** the NO About may spend more words on the Norway/language story; the EN version more on UK career detail. Facts identical; emphasis local.
3. **Glossary (fixed term pairs):** Systems Developer/Systemutvikler · case study/prosjektgjennomgang · public sector/offentlig sektor · work permit/oppholdstillatelse · experience/erfaring · skills/kompetanse · self-hosted/egendriftet. Keep product names (JobTrack, InboxIntel) and technology names untranslated.
4. **Quality gate:** a native/fluent Bokmål speaker reviews all NO copy before launch (flagged as an explicit pre-launch task — the current CV's Norwegian has minor tells, e.g. "Ytret fremragende kundeservice" should be "Ytet…"; the site must be cleaner than the CV).
5. **Tone parity:** understated in both; the NO version must never read as marketing-translated.

## 6. CV improvement recommendations (assets provided → must improve)

The current PDFs are two-column, heavily letter-spaced graphical CVs. Problems: (a) letter-spaced headings ("E X P E R I E N C E") and two-column order break ATS parsing badly — text extraction confirms scrambled reading order; (b) content undersells projects; (c) "mid-level" self-label undercuts an 8-year record.

**Recommendations (content design, no implementation):**
1. Produce a **single-column, ATS-safe layout**: standard headings (Experience, Education, Skills, Projects), no letter-spacing tricks, real text, consistent date formats.
2. Replace "Mid-level system developer" with **"Systems developer with eight years' experience"** in both languages.
3. Add a **Projects section** (JobTrack, InboxIntel, homelab — 2 lines each with stack) — currently the CV omits his strongest recent evidence entirely.
4. Split the 2015–2023 role into outcome bullets mirroring site copy (single source of truth with the site content model).
5. Fix Norwegian errors ("Ytret" → "Ytet", "holdt baren oppdatert på lager" → "holdt baren velfylt"); native review pass.
6. Add the website URL prominently; site and CV cross-promote.
7. Keep a designed "pretty" variant for humans if desired, but the *download default* is the ATS-safe version. Filenames: `Connor-Babbington-CV-EN.pdf` / `Connor-Babbington-CV-NO.pdf`.

## 7. SEO content (conceptual)

- Title patterns: `Connor Babbington — Systems Developer (.NET, React) · Tønsberg, Norway` / `Connor Babbington — Systemutvikler (.NET, React) · Tønsberg`. Case studies: `JobTrack — case study · Connor Babbington`.
- Meta descriptions handwritten per page per language (≤ 155 chars), answering "who/what/where".
- Structured data (conceptual): `Person` on home (name, jobTitle, address locality, sameAs → LinkedIn/Gitea), `SoftwareSourceCode`/`CreativeWork` per case study.
- OpenGraph: per-language OG images (name + role line + accent motif; generated per design system).