This repo provides the basics for a static site generated by Pelican, and managed by Netlify CMS. Deployments and hosting can also be managed by Netlify.
Netlify CMS uses Git Gateway to allow users to edit content without having an account with write access to the repository. Git gateway is only currently supported for Gitlab and Github hosted repositories.
Netfly CMS provides content editing of pages and articles. Netlify CMS commits changes directly to the repo on Publish. Content is stored in the code repo in the /content directory and the static pages are generated in /output.
Note: content can also be edited by committing changes directly to the repository, however Netlify CMS expects a specific set of fields at the top of content items so it’s easy to make mistakes which stop the CMS from working properly.
If configured to host, Netlify triggers a deployment automatically when the repo changes. This takes anything from a few seconds to a couple of minutes.
It's a good idea to skim read the Pelican Docs
Fork this repo in Gitlab or Github, clone it locally and cd into it.
Setup a python virtual environment with pyenv and virtualenv.
pyenv virtualenv pelican
pyenv local pelican
Install pelican and dependencies
pip install -r requirements.txt
Run pelican to read from the content directory and generate the site in the output directory - runs pelican content
make html
Run the pelican server to view the site at http://localhost:8000/ - runs pelican --listen
make serve
To be used by pelican the theme has to be installed see Pelican Themes docs
pelican-themes -i themes/bootstrap-next
Then it can be added in pelicanconf.yml
Then the content can be generated
make html
So far I have had to remove then reinstall the theme and regenerate content to review changes but there may be a better way of editing the theme. Try:
make devserver
The site should now be visible at http://localhost:8000/
The content can be edited in the CMS, so git pull frequently to stay in sync.
pelicanconf.yml is the main config file which can be overridden locally by pelicanconf-local.yml. See pelicanconf-local.yml.example
Netlify CMS files are in content/admin. The CMS is a single page React app included from a CDN in /content/admin/index.html. Netlify CMS is a generic CMS and is coupled to the structure and workflow of Pelican via config in /content/admin/config.yml
├── Makefile
├── README.md
├── content # THE CONTENT EDITED IN THE CMS
│ ├── admin # NETLIFY CMS
│ │ ├── config.yml # CONFIG FILE FOR NETLIFY CMS
│ │ └── index.html
│ ├── articles # ARTICLES FROM ANY CATEGORY
│ │ ├── ...
│ ├── extra # OTHER STATIC RESOURCES e.g favicon
│ │ └── ...
│ ├── images # UPLOADED IMAGES
│ │ ├── ...
│ └── pages # BASIC PAGES (NO CATEGORY)
│ └── ...
├── netlify-deploy.sh # DEPLOY SCRIPT CONFIGURED TO RUN ON DEPLOY IN NETLIFY
├── output # PUBLISHED WEB SITE
│ ├── ...
├── pelicanconf.py # MAIN PELICAN CONFIG
├── pelicanconf_local.example.py
├── pelicanconf_local.py # CREATE THIS FILE TO OVERRIDE CONFIG LOCALLY
├── plugins # PELICAN PLUGINS
│ └── i18n_subsites
│ ├── ...
├── publishconf.py
├── requirements.txt
├── tasks.py
└── themes # PELICAN THEMES
├── bootstrap-next # THEME BASE
│ ├── ...
Create an account on Netlify by logging in with whichever Git repo provider - Gitlab or Github - from here on assuming Gitlab
- Create "New site from Git"
- Choose your provider
- Authorise Netlify
- Choose your repo
- Build command should be
./netlify-deploy.sh - Output directory should be
output/ - Deploy site
Netlify will now clone your repo, run pelican content to generate the site HTML in the output directory, and then host the output directory on the web.
- Choose a URL for your site in Netlify e.g. this repo is at https://pelican-example.netlify.com/
- Add a page in pages (copy about.md and edit) - commit, push and see Netlify build and deploy automatically.
Netlify CMS is a single page React JS app that is loaded by the HTML file /content/admin/index.html.
For details about how Netlify CMS is configured for various site generators, read the docs at Netlify CMS. An example configuration file is provided in /content/admin/config.yml.
This section is taken from the Netlify CMS docs
Go to Settings > Identity, and select Enable Identity service.
Under Registration preferences, select Open or Invite only. In most cases, you want only invited users to access your CMS, but if you're just experimenting, you can leave it open for convenience.
If you'd like to allow one-click login with services like Google and GitHub, check the boxes next to the services you'd like to use, under External providers.
Scroll down to Services > Git Gateway, and click Enable Git Gateway. This authenticates with your Git host and generates an API access token. In this case, we're leaving the Roles field blank, which means any logged in user may access the CMS. For information on changing this, check the Netlify Identity documentation.
Themes are from Pelican Themes
Plugins are from Pelican Plugins
These are copied and committed into the repo for now which is NAUGHTY. We should remove the plugins and themes and workout how to install them from git in the deploy script so that we don't have a copy of them in this repo.