Moving to Blot

“Moving” by Matthew Hamilton on Unsplash

This blog has existed for a while (since 2004!), and over the years I've used several different platforms to host and manage it. These have included custom builds, Wordpress, Posterous (which was unfortunately cut short), and - most recently - Jekyll+Git+Netlify.

I much preferred static-site hosting, knowing that the site would never be locked into a platform as the content was stored simply as a set of Markdown text files. This meant that I could easily change things without needing to perform complicated export/imports across platforms.

As a ruby developer, I naturally settled on Jekyll, a popular static site engine that also powers Github Pages.

However, every time I came to write something for the site, I found myself being drawn into the minutae of managing the code that built the site, tweaking configurations and templates, updating gem dependencies, and so on.

As a result of this procrastination development, I hardly ever got round to publishing anything!

Blot

A couple of weeks ago, I stumbled across Blot. Within a few hours of trying out the service, I'd decided to use it for this site.

Just like Jekyll and other static-site generators, Blot compiles a folder of markdown files into a website. Amongst other things, Blot also handles the hosting, CDN/image hosting, theming, integrations, and most other technicalities for you.

Just like Jekyll, the files can be hosted in a Git repository. However, for even easier management, a Dropbox or Google Drive folder can be used instead. You can learn more about Blot works here.

Balance

For me, Blot seems to strike the right balance between a traditional CMS/hosted website (e.g, Wordpress), and the flexibility of a static-generated site.

This site is now running on Blot, and I'll likely be moving other sites here (such as plymouthsoftware.com and valuepricing.uk). I've also taken the opportunity to archive legacy posts and outdated tutorials to make some room for new content.

With Blot taking care of the technical detail, I hope to have far fewer distractions and so spend more time actually writing content and tutorials!