Hello, world!

2022-08-29T00:00:00+00:00

I have been thinking of starting a blog for a while, mostly to write about stuff that makes no sense to publish academically, but also to improve my writing skills. I expect to mostly write about Programming, Emacs, Linux, and other tech topics. But we will see where it goes.</p>

In this first post I will quickly go over the implementation and deployment of this site. You can find the source code for the website at https://git.adbjesus.com/adbjesus.com</a>.</p>

Static Site Generator</h3>
Since this site will contain static content, I've decided to go with a static site generator. In particular, I chose Zola</a>. The main reason for using Zola and not something else is that I am familiar with its implementation language (Rust). This can allow me to easily contribute to the project to fix any issue or scratch any itch.</p>
In terms of styling, I'm using simple templates and CSS I implemented myself, which match the light/dark system theme option set by the user. Something I am not yet doing, is using syntax highlighting for code in blog posts. Although Zola supports this, it does not support some of the languages that I want, such as Emacs Lisp and Nix, and it is using old and buggy Sublime syntaxes. There is currently an open issue</a> to replace the current system. Another option, would be to use a javascript based syntax highlighter. However, I would rather keep my site javascript-free. As a result, since I don't consider it to be a critical feature for now, I will not implement any syntax highlighting for the time being.</p>

Using Org</h3>

One issue I had with Zola is that it does not suppor Org</a> for writing content (see this issue</a>). However, I would prefer to use it instead of markdown because I prefer and am more comfortable with its syntax, but also because I want to be able to use Org Babel</a> to execute code within the .org</code> file directly when writing posts for which executing code is useful.</p>

Nonetheless, this proved not to be an issue for my simple use case because I can automatically convert .org</code> files to .md</code> files (following theCommonMark</a> spec) using pandoc</a>, and the ox-pandoc</a> package for Emacs. To setup ox-pandoc to export .org</code> files to CommonMark I have the following in my Emacs configuration:</p>

(use-package ox-pandoc
  :ensure t
  :after org
  :custom
  (org-pandoc-menu-entry
   '((?c "to cmk." org-pandoc-export-to-commonmark)
     (?C "to cmk and open." org-pandoc-export-to-commonmark-and-open))))
</code></pre>
Then, I put the index.org</code> for a blog post inside a dedicated folder
for that post:</p>
content
└── blog
   └── 01-hello-world
      ├── index.org
      └── ... // other files
</code></pre>
The index.org</code> file includes some metadata in its header for both Zola
and ox-pandoc. For example, for this post I'm using the following
header:</p>
#+TITLE: Hello, world!
#+DATE: 2022-08-25
#+PANDOC_METADATA: slug:hello-world
#+PANDOC_EXTENSIONS: commonmark+yaml_metadata_block
#+PANDOC_OPTIONS: standalone:t
#+PANDOC_OPTIONS: shift-heading-level-by:2
</code></pre>
The TITLE</code>, DATE</code>, and PANDOC_METADATA</code> fields are added to the
exported markdown metadata block. To add the metadata block to the
generated markdown file we set the yaml_metadata_block</code> pandoc
extension in PANDOC_EXTENSIONS</code>, and the standalone:t</code> option in
PANDOC_OPTIONS</code>. The last line is used to start the generated headings'
levels at 3 for styling purposes.</p>
Finally, I use the C-c C-e p c</code> shortcut to generate the markdown file,
which goes into the same folder, i.e.:</p>
content
└── blog
   └── 01-hello-world
      ├── index.org
      ├── index.md
      └── ... // other files
</code></pre>
You can find the Org source for this post here</a>.</p>
Deploying with Nix</h3>
I deploy this site to my NixOS</a> server using the
declarative NixOS configuration capabilities. For this I have a
flake.nix</code> in the repository of this site (edit: as of 2023-08-01 the
flake no longer uses flake-utils but the idea is the same, you can check
the latest version on the repository):</p>
{
  description = "My personal website";

  inputs = {
    nixpkgs = {
      url = "github:nixos/nixpkgs/nixos-22.05";
    };

    flake-utils = {
      url = "github:numtide/flake-utils";
      inputs.nixpkgs.follows = "nixpkgs";
    };
  };

  outputs = { self, nixpkgs, flake-utils }:
    flake-utils.lib.eachDefaultSystem (system:
      let
        pkgs = import nixpkgs { inherit system; };
      in rec {
        packages.website =
          pkgs.stdenv.mkDerivation {
            name = "website";
            src = self;

            buildInputs = [ pkgs.zola ];

            buildPhase = ''
              zola build
            '';

            installPhase = ''
              mkdir -p $out cp -Tr public $out/public
            '';
          };

        packages.default = self.packages.${system}.website;
      }
    );
}
</code></pre>
Then I add this repository to the inputs section of the NixOS
flake.nix</code> configuration file.</p>
inputs.website = {
  url = "git+https://git.adbjesus.com/website";
  inputs.nixpkgs.follows = "nixpkgs";
};
</code></pre>
and use the nginx.virtualHosts</code> option to deploy it:</p>
services.nginx.virtualHosts = {
  "adbjesus.com" = {
    default = true;
    forceSSL = true;
    enableACME = true;
    locations."/" = {
      root = "${website.packages.x86_64-linux.website}/public";
    };
  };
};
</code></pre>
In the future, I will write more about my NixOS configuration using
flakes, which I use to manage my personal computers and server.</p>
Edits</h3>

2023-01-08: Updated the link to the website, added note stating that I
no longer use flake-utils.</li>
</ul>

Alexandre Jesus (@adbjesus) - Blog

Hello, world!

Edits</h3> 2023-01-08: Updated the link to the website, added note stating that I no longer use flake-utils.</li> </ul>

Edits</h3>

2023-01-08: Updated the link to the website, added note stating that I no longer use flake-utils.</li> </ul>