Ask HN: How should I create my personal academic blog? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: How should I create my personal academic blog?

#21

Post by dhruvkar » Fri, Nov 02, 2018, 5:40 AM UTC

sammosummo wrote: post #17

Artemix wrote: post #3

Static websites are the way to go, and as for hosting, I personally find Netlify to be awesome, and well fit for static websites (my blog is built with a custom SSG, run by Netlify on every commit). You can simply use git for versioning, FrontMatter for article metadata (like title, published status etc.), reStructuredText or Markdown for writeup, and whichever tool you may see fit. If you don't want to build your ow…

Thanks! Could you be specific about where to purchase a domain? Sorry I’m not an expert in web-based stuff.

I find http://domains.google.com to be the simplest.

It comes with built-in privacy protection* and a free email forwarding service. So all emails to hello@yourdomain.com could be forwarded to your email.

* with recent news around Google + privacy, I'd take this with a grain of salt.

Re: Ask HN: How should I create my personal academic blog?

#22

Post by simon_acca » Fri, Nov 02, 2018, 8:03 AM UTC

While as a software engineer I'm partial towards static websites, I have to say the best academic site I've come across is a wordpress one that seems to use the "faculty" theme.

The site is Kelly Weinersmith's (of SMBC fame): http://www.weinersmith.com/

Re: Ask HN: How should I create my personal academic blog?

#23

Post by 50 » Fri, Nov 02, 2018, 12:22 PM UTC

Blot (https://blot.im) or GatsbyJS (https://gatsbyjs.org).

Re: Ask HN: How should I create my personal academic blog?

#24

Post by m11a » Fri, Nov 02, 2018, 3:52 PM UTC

Artemix wrote: post #3

Static websites are the way to go, and as for hosting, I personally find Netlify to be awesome, and well fit for static websites (my blog is built with a custom SSG, run by Netlify on every commit). You can simply use git for versioning, FrontMatter for article metadata (like title, published status etc.), reStructuredText or Markdown for writeup, and whichever tool you may see fit. If you don't want to build your ow…

One issue I have with static sites currently is adding/editing content from mobiles. Although you can create/edit files (by commits) from GitHub.com via your browser, using the web interface, it's not really too pleasant to work with (since, obviously, it isn't designed for this).

If you could sync your files over to something like Google Docs / Dropbox Paper, edit them there, and see the changes be automatically published to GitHub, that would be nice.

Other than that, I find static sites very nice for blogs. I don't really think most blogs need something like WordPress, it does seem a bit overkill to me.

Re: Ask HN: How should I create my personal academic blog?

#25

Post by m11a » Fri, Nov 02, 2018, 3:55 PM UTC

sammosummo wrote: post #17

Artemix wrote: post #3

Static websites are the way to go, and as for hosting, I personally find Netlify to be awesome, and well fit for static websites (my blog is built with a custom SSG, run by Netlify on every commit). You can simply use git for versioning, FrontMatter for article metadata (like title, published status etc.), reStructuredText or Markdown for writeup, and whichever tool you may see fit. If you don't want to build your ow…

Thanks! Could you be specific about where to purchase a domain? Sorry I’m not an expert in web-based stuff.

Cloudflare Domains is soon a thing (meant to be available from later this month in waves to current Cloudflare users, my guess is it should be available for all start of 2019). That might be nice. Cloudflare promises not to charge more than how much it costs them to get the domain, so they are dirt cheap domains, and Cloudflare has a great reputation for tolerance/no censorship - so you don't have to be worried about having your domain terminated/suspended.

Currently, namecheap is also quite popular, it's not especially elegant but it's cheap and secure. Tends to be my personal choice. I would immediately point your DNS to Cloudflare, after purchasing a domain, and manage your domain's records from Cloudflare.

Also worth checking out: https://www.gandi.net/ and https://njal.la/

Usually, namecheap is a safe bet. That'd be my recommendation, currently.

Re: Ask HN: How should I create my personal academic blog?

#26

Post by codegeek » Fri, Nov 02, 2018, 5:04 PM UTC

sammosummo wrote: post #18

codegeek wrote: post #12

WordPress could be a good fit if you set it up correctly. First, don't use cheap shared hosting. Get a VPS and setup a LEMP stack with PHP-FPM. Use PHP 7.2. Then select a non-bloated blog theme and delete/uninstall unnecessary plugins other than some caching (I highly recommend WP Fastest Cache & Autoptimize). Also, configure nginx to do things like gzip etc. I can assure you it will load fast. I have started my blog…

Thanks for the advice, I’ll investigate.

np. If you need help, I would be more than happy to help for free as I love servers and Linux stuff and this is my bread and butter :)

Re: Ask HN: How should I create my personal academic blog?

#27

Post by ryanlol » Fri, Nov 02, 2018, 5:07 PM UTC

m11a wrote: post #25

sammosummo wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks! Could you be specific about where to purchase a domain? Sorry I’m not an expert in web-based stuff.

Cloudflare Domains is soon a thing (meant to be available from later this month in waves to current Cloudflare users, my guess is it should be available for all start of 2019). That might be nice. Cloudflare promises not to charge more than how much it costs them to get the domain, so they are dirt cheap domains, and Cloudflare has a great reputation for tolerance/no censorship - so you don't have to be worried about…

>Cloudflare has a great reputation for tolerance/no censorship

Great but undeserved reputation. Cloudflare will ban your domain if a BigCo asks. Just try adding “doxagram.is” to your CF account.

Re: Ask HN: How should I create my personal academic blog?

#28

Post by lawson11 » Sat, Nov 03, 2018, 6:09 AM UTC

you can easily create https://djheadphonereview.com this type of blog

Re: Ask HN: How should I create my personal academic blog?

#29

Post by cryptography » Sat, Nov 03, 2018, 5:57 PM UTC

sammosummo wrote: post #17

Artemix wrote: post #3

Static websites are the way to go, and as for hosting, I personally find Netlify to be awesome, and well fit for static websites (my blog is built with a custom SSG, run by Netlify on every commit). You can simply use git for versioning, FrontMatter for article metadata (like title, published status etc.), reStructuredText or Markdown for writeup, and whichever tool you may see fit. If you don't want to build your ow…

Thanks! Could you be specific about where to purchase a domain? Sorry I’m not an expert in web-based stuff.

I recommend either IWantMyName or Namesilo. They have great support and no B.S. upsells a lot of providers have. I am not affiliated with them, just a customer.

Re: Ask HN: How should I create my personal academic blog?

#30

Post by atmosx » Sun, Nov 04, 2018, 9:22 PM UTC

codegeek wrote: post #12

WordPress could be a good fit if you set it up correctly. First, don't use cheap shared hosting. Get a VPS and setup a LEMP stack with PHP-FPM. Use PHP 7.2. Then select a non-bloated blog theme and delete/uninstall unnecessary plugins other than some caching (I highly recommend WP Fastest Cache & Autoptimize). Also, configure nginx to do things like gzip etc. I can assure you it will load fast. I have started my blog…

Just make sure you properly update and secure wordpress, keep and eye on the plugins, etc. I would not advise ppl not well versed in security to avoid wordpress and PHP apps in general if possible.