Basic Website Generator

This is a static website generator built with Rust. It converts Markdown files from the data/ directory into HTML files in the webpage/ directory. It also creates an index.html file that lists all articles chronologically, from newest to oldest. This setup is ideal for a simple personal blog.

Features

• Converts Markdown to HTML.
• Generates an index page with posts sorted by date.
• Supports a common HTML template for all pages.
• Substack Integration: Allows linking to a Substack post directly from your markdown.
• Cover Images: Automatically embeds a cover image in posts if a corresponding image file is found.
• Special Page Handling: about.md, newsletter.md, and 404.md are generated but not listed on the index. example.md is excluded from production builds.
• Responsive Design: Links to separate CSS files (style.css, mobile.css) for different screen sizes.
• SEO Friendly: Generates thumbnail meta tags for blog posts, improving social media sharing.
• Navigation: Includes a standard header with links to Home, Newsletter, and About pages. Active page links for "About" and "Newsletter" are highlighted.

Usage

To use this generator, you need Rust installed.

1. Clone this repository.
2. Create a .env file in the root of the project (see Configuration section below).
3. Create your articles in Markdown format in the data/ directory.
   • Title: The first line of your markdown should be the post title (e.g., ## My Awesome Post).
   • Date: The second line should be the date in MM-DD-YYYY format (e.g., 01-15-2024).
   • Substack Link (Optional): The third line can be a link to your Substack post, formatted as [substack post](your-substack-url).
   • Cover Image (Optional): To add a cover image, place an image file (e.g., my-post.jpg, my-post.png) in the images/ directory with the same name as your markdown file (e.g., my-post.md).
4. Run cargo run in the root directory to build the website.
   • The generator will continuously monitor the data/ folder for changes and regenerate pages automatically for fast iteration.
5. The generated website will be in the webpage/ directory.

Special Markdown File Handling

• about.md: Generated as webpage/about.html. Linked in the header of all pages. Not included in the index page list.
• newsletter.md: Generated as webpage/newsletter.html. Linked in the header of all pages. Not included in the index page list.
• 404.md: Generated as webpage/404.html. Not included in the index page list.
• example.md: This file is intended for testing or demonstration. It will be processed during development (when running cargo run without the --prod flag) but will be skipped in production builds.

Configuration

The project uses a .env file in the root directory for configuration:

• BASE_URL: The base URL of your website (e.g., https://example.com).
• TITLE: The title of your website (e.g., My Personal Blog).

Example .env file:

BASE_URL=https://yourdomain.com
TITLE=My Awesome Blog

CLI Flag: --prod

• By default (cargo run), the BASE_URL is adjusted for local development, pointing to the local webpage/ directory.
• To build for production using the BASE_URL from your .env file, run: cargo run -- --prod.

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License. See the LICENSE file for more details.