Cover image

A Pelican plugin that adds a cover_image_url attribute to articles and pages. Includes settings for local and default images.

Installation

Download this plugin
Place it in your plugins directory
Add pelican-cover-image to PLUGINS in your settings file.

Or see the general Plugin installation instructions.

Usage

Add the attribute cover_image to your article or page metadata:

title: My super title
date: 2010-12-03 10:20
cover_image: https://images.unsplash.com/photo-1471644865643-fe726490270a # Can also be a local image file, see further

This is the content of my super blog post.

This will activate the cover_image_url attribute for all articles (including drafts) and pages (including hidden pages), which you can use in templates as follows:

Article template:

<img src="{{ article.cover_image_url }}" alt="Cover image">

Page template:

<img src="{{ page.cover_image_url }}" alt="Cover image">

Using local images

If you want to use local images in addition to full image URLs, you need to define in your settings file where those are stored:

COVER_IMAGES_PATH = "static/cover_images" # No trailing slash

Make sure that path is included in STATIC_PATHS so Pelican will copy all cover images to the output directory (see Pelican documentation):

STATIC_PATHS = ["static"] # Since /cover_images is a subdirectory of /static, it is included here

With the above settings, the cover_image_url for the following article will be http://example.com/static/cover_images/unicorn.jpg (format: SITEURL/COVER_IMAGES_PATH/cover_image):

title: My super title
date: 2010-12-03 10:20
cover_image: unicorn.jpg

This is the content of my super blog post.

Using a default image

By default cover_image_url will be empty if cover_image is not defined (either as URL or local file) in the article or page metadata. If you want to set a default image for all pages and articles, add one to your settings file:

COVER_IMAGE_DEFAULT = "https://images.unsplash.com/photo-1489513963600-afa31b458fec"

COVER_IMAGE_DEFAULT can also be a local image file, using the same settings as described above.

COVER_IMAGE_DEFAULT = "default_image.jpg" # Will look for image at COVER_IMAGES_PATH

Give credit

Only use images you have the right to use. If you are using images licensed under Creative Commons Attribution or alike, you can easily add extra attributes to your metadata:

title: My super title
date: 2010-12-03 10:20
cover_image: https://images.unsplash.com/photo-1471644865643-fe726490270a
cover_image_by: Ray Hennessy
cover_image_link: https://unsplash.com/photos/DAHUS8W4rNE

This is the content of my super blog post.

And adapt your template to:

<figure>
     <img src="{{ page.cover_image_url }}" alt="Cover image">
     <figcaption>Image by <a href="{{ page.cover_image_link }}">{{ cover_image_by }}</a></figcaption>
</figure>

peterdesmet/pelican-cover-image