If you’re reading this you probably noticed the change. No longer am I using blogspot/blogger to post my updates, I am now using Github pages and a static site generator called Jekyll.
It’s been a bit of a bumpy start to learn how the software works, but that’s what happens with software. Trial and error will bring you closer to success (usually).
After messing around with Jekyll’s settings, various themes, and making a dozen commits to Github I think I have found I layout I like. I have tried TeXt, Minimal Mistakes, Atlas, and now finally Chirpy to use as a theme for my site. I like chirpy as it’s simple yet it still has a considerable amount of features when compared to other Jekyll themes. For instance recently updated, estimated reading time, and tags on the homepage.
However, that is just a theme. Overall I moved away from Blogger because I wanted more flexibility. With Github pages you can simply upload raw html files without all the frontend. I know that Blogger has an HTML editor, but me being like other self-hosting open source people I wanted MORE CONTROL!!! And that’s why I ended up here.
Personally I would say that a somewhat ideal blog platform would be Wordpress. Due to its popularity it has hundreds (heck maybe thousands) of plugins and countless tutorials. But there are a couple issues, the first being that it isn’t free. A true wordpress.org instance being hosted on a reliable server will cost money. Second is security. I can monitor the attacks on the services hosted on my home server and how they are 99% of the time aimed at wordpress. I don’t even host wordpress on my server, but I see countless http requests to things like /wp-admin/ and /wp-content/. Wordpress is like windows, wildly popular and wildly hacked.
Because it doesn’t have a nice block editor like wordpress I have to write my pages in markdown, which is fine, but like other keyboard intensive softwares I will have to memorize a few things. Hashtags for headings, asterisk for italics, I’m getting there slowly but surely. Abricotine has been an awesome software for writing markdown. I suggest you check it out if you need to write markdown files often.
Obviously I still have a few issues to work out such as embedding YouTube videos and easily inserting dates and categories to the tops of the posts, but eventually I’m sure I’ll find solutions.
This was a very quick post that I typed up, but I hope you enjoyed reading it. I have been pretty busy lately, but I hope to get back into my normal YouTube routine and get some content released. I’m anxious to release videos of all the cool stuff I’ve been working on!