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diff --git a/www/blog/2022-11-06/index.html b/www/blog/2022-11-06/index.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..4a1983b --- /dev/null +++ b/www/blog/2022-11-06/index.html @@ -0,0 +1,237 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html lang="en"> +<head> + <meta charset="utf-8"> + <meta name="generator" + content="HTML Tidy for HTML5 for Linux version 5.6.0"> + <title>senders.io - My Markdown -> HTML Setup</title> + <link rel='stylesheet' + type='text/css' + href='/index.css'> + <meta name="viewport" + content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1"> +</head> +<body> + <div id='header'> + <a class='title' + href='/'>senders.io</a> + <nav> + <a href="/resume">Resume</a> <a href="/blog">Blog</a> <a rel= + "noopener noreferrer external" + target="_blank" + href="https://github.com/s3nd3r5">Github</a> + </nav> + </div> + <div id="body"> + <article> + <h2>My Markdown -> HTML Setup</h2> + <p>A common way I see a lot of people blog, especially micro-blog, is in + <a rel="external noopener noreferrer" + target="_blank" + href="https://daringfireball.net/projects/markdown/">markdown</a>.</p> + <figure> + <blockquote> + <p>Markdown is a lightweight markup language for creating formatted + text using a plain-text editor.</p> + </blockquote> + <figcaption> + <cite>— <a rel="external noopener noreferrer" + target="_blank" + href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Markdown">Wikipedia | + Markdown</a></cite> + </figcaption> + </figure> + <p>It built itself on-top of common syntax prevalent on the web and was + designed to be converted into simple HTML output. Since it leveraged + preexisting syntax it was easy for new users to pick up, and is now found + all over the web and applications.</p> + <p>Since I started this website, I had been writing each page by hand + using a few tools to facilitate that - and for a while I had been looking + for a good way to try out using markdown to generate some lighter pages + and these blogposts.</p> + <h3>Writing HTML by hand</h3> + <p>When it comes to blogging a lot of platforms offer WYSIWYG editor – + allowing users to write in rich-text that then gets converted into HTML + in the style of the platform. But for my case, since I self host this + website, I decided to stick to my roots and write PURE HTML instead.</p> + <p>HTML is fairly simple and easy once you get use to the basic structure + of the system. And since I’ve been working in HTML almost two decades + now, at the time it felt like the best solution to make a clean + website.</p> + <p>I briefly touched on my design process in <a href= + "/blog/2019-01-21/">2019-01-21 - First! A New Years Resolution</a> + outlining that I wanted to make a very lightweight and simple website. + And at the time I believed the best way to achieve this goal was to + carefully structure and craft my website’s HTML by hand.</p> + <p>This article is making the process sound far more difficult than it is + – it’s mostly just tedious.</p> + <pre><code><article> +<h2> Title </h2> +<p> + Some paragraph.... +</p> +<h3> +<p> some subsection </p> +</h3> +<p> more text </p> +... etc +</code></pre> + <p>Is essentially what the website looks like - you can view the source + of this page to see – it’s very simple HTML.</p> + <p>The benefit I found doing this, mostly leveraging <a href= + "www.html-tidy.org/">tidy</a>, allowed a very easy to edit codebase. And + by leveraging the existing tags and their properties I also attempted to + keep the styling to an absolute minimum. Using existing tags to enforce + the styling I desired.</p> + <p>Only for certain areas (tables, code, quotes) where readability is an + issue do I setup custom CSS.</p> + <p>Most of this process is actually what will continue to happen but the + actual writing process will be unobstructed by the tedium of writing + HTML.</p> + <h3>Micro-blogging in general</h3> + <p>At the time of writing this, I have no ported over any of my <a rel= + "external noopener noreferrer" + target="_blank" + href="https://gemini.circumlunar.space/">Gemini</a> micro-blogs. This + warrants a longer post, since I wrote consistently in gemini from + March 2021 through May 2021 – having only stopped due to a long move + leading to a lot of server downtime breaking the habit. My gemini + updated multiple days a week - mostly due to the extremely lightweight + and limited nature of the platform.</p> + <h4>Gemtext</h4> + <p><a rel="external noopener noreferrer" + target="_blank" + href="https://gemini.circumlunar.space/docs/gemtext.gmi">Gemtext</a> + was the gemini protocol’s standard MIME type. It was a basic markup + language that relied on line based syntax. It was purposefully as lean + as necessary because this was what was ACTUALLY being served to + clients – unlike Markdown which first needed to be converted to HTML, + gemtext was the actual text served and rendered on the viewers client. + You could customize the style of your client - but you could not, as + an author, dictate how your content would be viewed. This meant the + only aspects of your blog you had control over was the actual content + and it’s structure – which for a blog is really all you should care + about.</p> + <p>It’s syntax contained most of what I was actually using here already + from HTML:</p> + <ol> + <li>headings</li> + <li>paragraphs that were wrapped based on page-width</li> + <li>links</li> + <li>lists</li> + <li>quotes</li> + <li>preformatted-text / codeblocks</li> + </ol> + <p>Besides links - it also leveraged the same common syntaxes that + markdown did.</p> + <h4>Gemtext links</h4> + <p>From my brief time in the IRC and in geminispace in general - a lot of + the “recommendations” came from new users about providing in-line links. + The philosophy was that by forcing links to exist on their own line - + clients could configure how they wanted these to be seen and not have to + worry about links interfering with the text.</p> + <figure> + <blockquote> + <p>Like Gopher (and unlike Markdown or HTML), Gemtext only lets you + put links to other documents on a line of their own. You can’t make a + single word in the middle of a sentence into a link. This takes a + little getting used to, but it means that links are extremely easy to + find, and clients can style them differently (e.g. to make it clear + which protocol they use, or to display the domain name to help users + decide whether they want to follow them or not) without interfering + with the readability of your actual textual content.</p> + </blockquote> + <figcaption> + — <cite><a rel="external noopener noreferrer" + target="_blank" + href= + "https://gemini.circumlunar.space/docs/gemtext.gmi">gemini.circumlunar.space + – A quite introduction to “gemtext” markup | Links</a></cite> + </figcaption> + </figure> + <p>I felt that this provided a lot of useful limitations that removed a + huge barrier for me to actually write down ideas without feeling over + burdened. I also lurked in the IRC - as well as <a rel= + "external noopener noreferrer" + target="_blank" + href="https://github.com/s3nd3r5/java-gemini-server">implemented my + own gemini server</a>.</p> + <p>As a quick aside – the java server was a lot of fun! The protocol was + very simple to work with for basic gemtext. I felt the ultimate downside + was trying to build something for basic gemini capsule hosting (like I + was using for a decent chunk of my time with gemini) - and something for + developers to use as a base application server. At the time in 2021 a lot + of talk was happening on IRC of users starting to look to provide more + complex experiences via the protocol and I wanted a way for those + interactions to be built out in Java - since most were in Go or Python at + the time. This decision lead to me burning out due to difficulties + splitting those responsiblities easily - where you could host along side + your application - since I lacked the experience with more complex Gemini + capsule applications.</p> + <p>But it was a good experience and I got hands on experience with Certs, + Netty, and SNI - which actually came in handy at my job!</p> + <h3>Wasn’t this about Markdown?</h3> + <p>A lot of what I liked about Gemini I found missing when I returned to + the World Wide Web. Writing a new post was tedious and I actually had a + few drafts sitting unposted. They’re probably checked into my git at this + moment! So I thought - why not just use markdown and convert to HTML? + That’s what it’s built for - and I already designed my site to work with + minimal customization of raw HTML tags!</p> + <h3>How I use Markdown</h3> + <p>Firstly, this blogpost was written in Markdown (with minimal HTML + sprinkled in). Then I render the markdown into HTML using <a rel= + "external noopener noreferrer" + target="_blank" + href= + "https://www.pell.portland.or.us/~orc/Code/discount/">Discount</a>. + Frankly, I don’t know how I stumbled across this markdown parser - I + think it came pre-installed on my KDE Arch system because another KDE + program used it. But I liked it, and it seemed extensible enough for + my needs.</p> + <p>This would produce the “body” of my articles - and I could then + prepend and append the template-head and foot to my html output to form a + blog post/web page.</p> + <h4>Customizations</h4> + <p>After I generated the output file, I replaced some placeholders in the + templates via <code>sed</code> and then <code>tidy</code>’d the HTML. The + only other major issue was Discount had no way of appending any link + attributes – so for external links I had <code>sed</code> append the + <code>rel</code> and <code>target</code> attributes - which work off the + assumption they’re not there. A lot of my home-server scripts rely on + assumptions…</p> + <p>This is all bundled up in a simple script file so I can just supply a + few arguments and the full page is re-rendered on command.</p> + <h3>Two Sources of Truth</h3> + <p>In the sytem I devised the markdown files are really the “source of + truth” but you could argue that the HTML files hold equal weigh - as + they’re what you’re reading right now. The markdown is only useful if I + render it as HTML. There exist nginx extensions to serve markdown as HTML + so I store everything as markdown. I could also provide some heading + information to the markdowns to remove the command arguments and have on + boot it generate the .html files in place before launching the site… But + these are all nice ideas for a later date.</p> + <p>Ultimately, this is something I contribute to ocassionally - I don’t + need something too complicated. I just need to output some HTML a few + times a year. So if I manually publish the HTML each time - that’s likely + far more efficent then re-rendering.</p> + <h3>Learnings</h3> + <p>This is the first post that uses this - though I’ve converted a page + over to this already. But once I worked out the kinks and built a flow + that works for me - this made the writing process a LOT easier. Another + issue was that once I <code>tidy</code>’d the HTML file - it became + frustrating to edit, and I didn’t always re-tidy it. Because the output + is always <code>tidy</code>’d by the script - I can edit the raw markdown + as needed. And the script generally will always output the same file + (with whatever changes I made of course). This makes the editing and git + history a lot clearer.</p> + <p>I would recommend writing in markdown - or even trying out gemini - + you can host your gemini capsule on the web even! (Most gemini webpages + are gemini capsules converted). I am sure other “blog focused markups” + also exist too.</p> + </article> + <div id="footer"> + <i>November 06, 2022</i> + </div> + </div> +</body> +</html> |