Starting again in the text-only web

Years ago I used to blog. I used Wordpress since v1.x. Eventually I got lost working with a complex theme (Divi) and it wasn't fun anymore. On top of that we got cancel culture and I moved to a country where saying the wrong thing can get you years in prison. I've hardly posted in a decade.

Lately I've enjoyed the relative quiet of Geminispace and Gopherspace. It reminds me of the kinds of sites I used to visit in my high-school computer lab in the 1990s, like the Ultima Dragons Internet Chapter, of writing and reading things in text-mode apps for DOS, and visiting BBSes. It reminds me of that time, too, and the people and places I knew.

Gemini could be a fun way to make a new site, but I haven't quite figured out how to host and build it. Just hand code? Or are there tools, like a CMS or a static site generator, that can make a site that you can read on the web, Gopher, and Gemini, like this one?

For now I'm starting here, drinking a kishu highball with you.

rkk

There are a tonne of tools, actually. The one I've been keeping in my back pocket is a "theme" (if you can say that) for hugo-based static sites. Something I've noticed (though I haven't updated it in a while) is that it doesn't generate an Atom feed so link aggregators won't accept your submissions.

Hugo-2-Gopher-and-Gemini

Generally speaking though, a gemini server is super easy to use (if you don't need reverse proxying!) because there are just a tonne of servers available and the only formatting available is whatever gemtext gets ya. In other words: its way simpler to host a good looking capsule than it is to host a good looking http site.

Definitely be careful if you've got censorship laws in place that can affect you though.

As far as starting here, yeah, this place is pretty chill.

kai

I honestly love how relaxed this community is