this post was submitted on 21 May 2025
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I ran my own blog for many years but recently I suspect my server got hacked, and after reinstalling I want to do things a little differently.

I'd like to move away from PHP and I don't really need a dynamic CMS anyhow.

So far I've been using PicoCMS which serves content from markdown pages with a little header. I got quite good at it, wrote my own theme and a few plugins. The templating language is Twig so something similar would be a boon for me.

Writing content in markdown is my most important requirement, or rather reusing the existing pages with as little massaging as possible. Here is one example:

***
Title: Create WiFi Hotspot with NetworkManager
date: 24.11.2022
Tags: archlinux,android
template: post
***

# Make sure required depenencies are installed

blablablablablablablabla

I really want a tag cloud, which used to be my only sorting mechanism apart from date. Most generators, at first glance, offer a tags page. Honestly I have no idea if I'd have to template the cloud myself but tag functionality seems to be common, I guess?

What I don't want is any sort of web UI or even builtin server functionality or other bells and whistles for the user. I prefer to ssh into the server and do things on the CLI.

Now my most important constraint is that I want to use what's available in (or as a) Debian repositories. After a quick search around it boils down to:

Searching for similar topics I found this and this. I read all the comments.

TIA


edit: Lots of people mention Hugo. Why would I choose that over, say, Jekyll or Pelican?
Personally I feel drawn more towards Python than Go or Rust, and a Twig-like (e.g. Jinja) templating language. If that's idiotic, please let me know why.
Also please remember I'm not running a github (or other similar VCS) page but have a dedicated VPS running Debian Stable. Deployment or containerization are of no interest to me.


edit2: For now I have settled on Pelican - both frontmatter and templating feel very familiar to me. I might even be able to port my PicoCMS theme over. I have not tried to install plugins via pip yet.

Thanks to all!


In the end I chose Pelican soon after this and have been using it happily ever since.

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[–] mutual_ayed@sh.itjust.works 12 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] A_norny_mousse@feddit.org 5 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

~~wrt~~ With regard to all I specified, why?

[–] mutual_ayed@sh.itjust.works 7 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

https://blog.cubieserver.de/2020/adding-a-tag-cloud-to-my-hugo-blog/

Fast, secure, bundled how you want and integrates easily with caddy and git runners.

https://docs.gitlab.com/tutorials/hugo/

Also is easily run in a container locally and deployed to a VPS or anywhere you like. Uses native markdown and is still actively developed.

https://www.erraticbits.ca/post/2019/blog-hugo-gitlab/

[–] A_norny_mousse@feddit.org 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I'm skeptical because it seems tied to the github universe.

And here's what other people commented about Hugo:

  • "It gets admittedly more complex if you’re wanting to write your own theme though."
  • "But as soon as you do want to customize it, you’re stuck learning one of the most esoteric languages that wasn’t meant as a joke."
  • "The documentation is unclear and there’s a chicken and egg problem about how to learn Hugo."

What do you think?

edit: lol the downvoting fanbois. Try to answer the questions if you really think Hugo is superior.

[–] gofsckyourself@lemmy.world 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] bagelberger@lemmy.world 9 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] gofsckyourself@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I thought that might be what they were saying, but then it would be "with regard to to" so I was unsure.

Initialisms like this bug me because they cause confusion for the most minimal amount of benefit.

[–] 3abas@lemm.ee 3 points 1 year ago

I was hoping to find an answer the original question in this dialog.