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This site is crafted with HTML5 and CSS assembled by a Ruby programming language based software toolchain of my own devising that leverages the work of thousands of open source software developers. The layout is crafted to allow a pleasant presentation of both long flows of text as well as large photographs. The font is Proxima Nova by Mark Simonson served up by WebINK.

The site is served up by the Apache webserver and is hosted on a Joyent Cloud SmartMachine.

I endeavor to make this site look great on modern web browsers and on devices like the iPhone and iPad. I couldn’t, however, give a flip about old versions of Internet Explorer.

How it’s Made

Years ago, I’d promised myself that I wouldn’t build another content management system. There should be enough of them in the world by now, after all. After trying everything multiple times, however, I kept bumping into one limitation or another. So, I gave in and built another, first on Rails and then later as a standalone Ruby application. I’m both pleased with it and very annoyed that I felt it was necessary.

Here’s a quick overview of how it works: I have a repository of text and media files that I manage with git and GitHub. Each post, link, and page is a separate text file. Whenever I add content or change something, I kick my toolchain into action with rake. All of the text files are read in and processed with ERB and Markdown, then any HTML files that need an update are created using HAML templates and are then written out. Images are also scanned and processed into whatever sizes are needed by ImageMagick. When everything is ready, a quick run of rsync updates everything on the server.

It’s very much akin to how Tim Bray bakes his website and Martin Fowler uses Rake to generate his. If software isn’t in your lexicon and you don’t have a secret fascination with text processing, you probably don’t want to do it this way. It works well for me, however, and has quite a few advantages that I’m putting to good use.

Frequent Questions

Couldn’t WordPress work for your needs?
I’m sure it could. WordPress has grown up to be an amazing and capable content management system. However, where I’m taking this site goes outside of WordPress’s normal box and I really wanted to use a toolset that I was thoroughly capable of using instead of spending time learning WordPress internals and dealing with PHP.

Can I get a copy of your code?
Unfortunately, no. The bits I’ve written to make things work around here are very specific for my own needs. Generalizing, documenting, and supporting it for others wouldn’t be trivial and isn’t going to happen anytime soon.

Can I get a template of your layout that will work with WordPress or Tumblr?
The templates I’ve built are integral parts of my toolchain and can’t be applied to any other blogging software. If you’re versed in HTML and CSS and are interested in how I did something, view source is your friend. Please don’t duplicate the look and feel of this site, however. Make what you take your own. Remix.

Can I get a copy of your fonts?
The fonts aren’t mine. But you can use them your own site. Go to WebINK and set up an account. They make it pretty darn easy.

Advisories

At no time during the building of this site were any bits, electrons, or packets harmed or asked to do anything immoral. This website is an equal opportunity consumer of compute resources. Made in USA unless I happen to be traveling at the time. The giveaway is usually the timezone in the timestamp on the bottom of each page. Subject to change at any time.