12.31.21

just in time for the new year, because the internet has its own blogging software! still trying to think of a clever name.

it's the crystallization of what i have wanted in a blog:

• server-side: i'm not at scale and the code isn't complex, so there's no real upside to pure static-gen software.
• markdown support and rendering: the code looks for a specified directory, pulls any *.md pages, and renders them as HTML. i have implemented some very crude control over the way the code lists files and for now markdown files have to be named using a YYYY.MM.DD.md format, but doing so will result in new posts appearing at the top in descending order.
• simple - this was the biggest reason for this project: taking the things i love about Mecha CMS and getting rid of the sprawling source code. don't get me wrong! Mecha is a great piece of software, but the author has implemented a lot of extras that cover all sorts of use cases that i have no need for.

the result is a project that allows you to run a markdown-powered lightweight blog built around the use and portability that the markdown file format allows. the goal will be to keep is as barebones-simple as i can, and for now this means you can get started with 5 files and a directory for markdown pages.

the first file, index.php, is a simple php script that stitches all the following together:

• the header.html that styles the page,
• the Parsedown markup library,
• all markdown files located in post/*.md, displayed in order from new to old
• the footer.html page, which for now simply closes the HTML tags.

TODO:

• view single posts
• allow support for YAML frontmatter, to expand on the ways the parser sorts and handles posts
• refine the markdown parsing to handle more exotic markup such as footnotes¹ / granular header formatting.

12.28.21

if you can read this, i've succeeded! nothing too fancy, everything is more or less powered by parsedown. things i would like to try to implement on top:

• support for footnotes¹
• granular header control - right now all # header, ## header, and ### header lines are formatted as <h2>

11.20.21

revisited the idea of 'because the internet' and have decided that a good way to keep procrastinating would be by deciding that i need to roll my own build system.

the skeleton will be basic: using include to stitch a header and footer onto a single file. simple enough, but the real challenge will be implementing a markdown parser - allowing me to keep a single blog.md page!