Postmarkdown

A simple Rails blog engine powered by Markdown.

Postmarkdown is compatible with Rails 3 only and the gem is (soon to be) hosted on RubyGems.org.

Features

Markdown files for blog posts
No database
RSS Feed
Customizable Routes
Built-in minimal theme (optional)
HTML5
Rails engine (so you can override models, views, controllers, etc)
Easily customized

Installation

Simply add Postmarkdown to your Gemfile and bundle it up:

gem 'postmarkdown'

Then, run the generator to setup Postmarkdown for your application:

$ rails generate postmarkdown:install

The above command performs the following actions:

Create the directory app/posts/. This directory is where your markdown files will live.
Generate an example post using today's date, eg. app/posts/2011-01-01-example-post.markdown.
Add some routes. By default the routes are setup underneath the path /posts/*, to customize these routes check out the Customizing Routes section below.

Usage

Generate a new Post

Here's an example of how to generate a new post using a slug and publish date:

$ rails generate postmarkdown:post test-post --date=2011-01-01

The above command will create the file app/posts/2011-01-01-test-post.markdown, which you can edit and add content to.

View the Post

Open http://localhost:3000/posts in your browser and you should be able to navigate to your new post. The URL for your new post is http://localhost:3000/posts/2011/01/01/test-post.

Overriding Files

The easiest way to customize the Postmarkdown functionality or appearance is by using the override generator. This generator can copy files from the Postmarkdown core and place them into your Rails app. For example:

$ rails generate postmarkdown:override --all        # overrides all of the things
$ rails generate postmarkdown:override --controller # overrides `app/controllers/posts_controller.rb`
$ rails generate postmarkdown:override --model      # overrides `app/models/post.rb`
$ rails generate postmarkdown:override --views      # overrides all files in directory `app/views/posts/`
$ rails generate postmarkdown:override --theme      # overrides the layout and stylesheet

RSS Feed

Postmarkdown comes prepared with a fully functional RSS feed.

You can take advantage of the built-in feed by adding the feed link to your HTML head tag. For example, simply add the following to your default layout:

<head>
  <!-- include your stylesheets and javascript here... -->
  <%= yield :head %>
</head>

To customize the feed title, add the following to an initializer (config/initializers/postmarkdown.rb):

Postmarkdown::Config.options[:feed_title] = 'Custom Blog Title Goes Here'

To link to the feed in your app, simply use the route helper: <%= link_to 'RSS Feed', posts_feed_path %>

Built-in Theme

Postmarkdown comes with minimal built-in theme for your convenience. To turn on the theme, add the following to an initializer (config/initializers/postmarkdown.rb):

Postmarkdown::Config.options[:use_theme] = true

Customizing Routes

By default Postmarkdown will setup all routes to go through the /posts/* path. For example:

http://example.com/posts                      # lists all posts
http://example.com/posts/2011                 # lists all posts from 2011
http://example.com/posts/2011/01              # lists all posts from January 2011
http://example.com/posts/2011/01/01           # lists all posts from the 1st of January 2011
http://example.com/posts/2011/01/01/test-post # show the specified post

You can change the default route path by modifying the 'postmarkdown' line in routes.rb. For example:

postmarkdown :as => :blog

This will produce the following routes:

http://example.com/blog                      # lists all posts
http://example.com/blog/2011                 # lists all posts from 2011
http://example.com/blog/2011/01              # lists all posts from January 2011
http://example.com/blog/2011/01/01           # lists all posts from the 1st of January 2011
http://example.com/blog/2011/01/01/test-post # show the specified post

You can also customize the posts#show route via the :permalink_format option:

postmarkdown :as => :blog, :permalink_format => :day   # URL: http://example.com/blog/2011/01/01/test-post
postmarkdown :as => :blog, :permalink_format => :month # URL: http://example.com/blog/2011/01/test-post
postmarkdown :as => :blog, :permalink_format => :year  # URL: http://example.com/blog/2011/test-post
postmarkdown :as => :blog, :permalink_format => :slug  # URL: http://example.com/blog/test-post

What about mapping Postmarkdown to root? We got you covered:

postmarkdown :as => ''
root :to => 'posts#index'

Example Directory Structure

├── app
│   ├── controllers
│   ├── helpers
│   ├── mailers
│   ├── models
│   ├── posts (where your markdown files live)
│   │   ├── 2011-04-01-example-1.markdown
│   │   ├── 2011-04-02-example-2.markdown
│   │   ├── 2011-04-03-example-3.markdown
│   │   ├── 2011-04-04-example-4.markdown
│   └── views
│       └── posts (overridable)
│           ├── _feed_link.html.haml
│           ├── _post.html.haml
│           ├── feed.xml.builder
│           ├── index.html.haml
│           └── show.html.haml

TODO

Syntax highlighting for code blocks
Generated routes should show example usage
Support more file formats, eg. textile

twe4ked/postmarkdown