What would it take to migrate all the content in blog.lfe.io to lfe.io/blog?

[oubiwann]

Let's explore, and then create a detailed epic ticket to make it happen. Things to get working with the Rust static site generator:

• [x] MathJax posts - should end up being conditionals in templates, based upon enabling (boolean) in the post's metadata
• [x] CSS stylings for everything under /blog - not too bad
• [x] Templates for various sections (tags, categories, authors, etc.) - straight-forward
• [x] Template for actual posts - ditto
• [x] Template for /blog - easy
• [ ] Figure out how to closely duplicate URL layout
• [ ] Create a script to put redirects into all the old posts to their new locations

[oubiwann]

It would be nice if we could keep using https://github.com/lfe/blog for its issue tracker ... we could do one of two things:

Option 1

• Make github.com/lfe/site/blog a git submodule that pointed to github.com/lfe/blog
  • we could do this in master at the root and delete all other branches in the repo
  • this would essentially make the lfe/blog repo read-only
  • as such, we'd need to put a generated README in there that let potential contributors know this and also point them to the proper location to make contributions

Option 2

• Empty out the repo
• Add a README that lets potential contributors know the repo exists only for the issue tracker

[oubiwann]

So, after some deep exploration of Zola, I don't think I can easily do what I want to do with things as they are. This essentially boils down to how taxonomies are handled (e.g., "tags", "categories", "authors", etc.): the problem being that these are all processed at the top-level directory. For us, the top-level directory is the LFE site itself; the blog will sit under that. We want /blog/tags etc. not /tags.

Two possible ways forward are:

1. Keep blog content where it currently is, published to the lfe/blog repo. The "builder" code for Zola could be anywhere (in the same repo, or in the site repo) ... but it would be nice to keep a unified set of stylings in one location ... maybe even a repo of its own?

2. Move all the content -- builder and actual blog -- out of the current lfe/blog repo and into the lfe/lfe.github.io repo, moving the current code in the builder branch into a "site" subdir, and creating a "blog" subdir for the blog builder code. A new top-level Makefile could be created that would build both and publish them optionally together (at the same time) or separately, as needed.

I've been pondering this for about a day, and still haven't landed on a decision. Will continue to weigh and experiment ...

[oubiwann]

I want to rule out the approach of separate sass, site and blog repos ... but:

1. to manage those, I would put them in a single repo as submodules, and
2. if I don't go that route and put everything in lfe/lfe.github.io, I'll still might be creating a git submodule for the lfe/blog repo ...

So, there will probably be a git submodule setup, regardless. Also, if any content or builder code ends up in two or more separate repos, there will definitely be a main repo to consolidate these resources and reduce maintenance overhead and increase the chance of contributions.

Additionally, in Zola, we can't exactly duplicate the same URLs as those produced by the existing blog, though I did get them close. Witness:

Current blog: https://blog.lfe.io/site/2014/05/22/1849-new-lfe-site/ Possible new URLs

• https://lfe.io/blog/archives/2014/05/22/1849-new-lfe-site/, or
• https://blog.lfe.io/archives/2014/05/22/1849-new-lfe-site/

To get Zola to be that close took some hacking / duplicate that will have to be scripted with Makefile targets. But his does mean that we'll need to set up some redirects that point from the old blog.lfe.io/site URLs to whatever the new base URL will be.

These options show there's not really a clear winner in approach, thus my delay in making a decision.

[oubiwann]

Ran into a bit of a sticky situation -- see comments in #105. Trying to work through it now.