Everything old is new again

Has it been that long?

I’m depressed to see that I haven’t written since November of 2010. That’s bad. We’ll say I’ve been busy and move on. K? K.

Nanoc?

Yup. I originally created this blog using jekyll, “a blog-aware, static site generator”. I liked it just fine. But ever since using nanoc to build a handful of sites, I’ve wanted to switch over. I’ve finally done it. I had thought about completely revamping the CSS, but in the end I just tweaked it slightly. I may still come back and tweak it some more.

Differences

So what, exactly, has changed behind the scenes?

• nanoc instead of jekyll as the site generator, as I said above. This is the biggest change.
• Sass instead of raw CSS. I’m just beginning to experiment with this, so for the moment, it’s really .scss files with raw CSS in them. That should change in the next couple of weeks.
• Redcarpet instead of Rdiscount for Markdown to HTML conversion. (As an added bonus, I’m finally using SmartyPants to get proper punctuation.)
• I’m no longer using Typekit for fonts. That means that my semi-monthly switches to various exotic fonts is out. Instead, I’m using the DejaVu family from FontSquirrel.
• Not to do with this site, nanoc or jekyll, but I’m using rbenv instead of rvm. I had a clean machine (wiped the hard drive and upgraded to Lion), so I decided to experiment. So far I like it a lot.

The source code for this site is still on Github. Feel free to poke around, if you’re curious.

What’s next?

School is back in session very soon. I would like to write more (such a cliché, but true). I’ll shoot for at least one post a month.

In terms of software projects, I’m working on a Sinatra site related to the Washington Capitals. Yes, that’s odd, but my wife is a huge fan, and I came across a really fun idea. Also, it gives me an excuse to get to know Sinatra better. Details forthcoming.