I just started moving my blog from <<http://svbtle.com(Svbtle)>> to a static blog generated that I created. It is based on <<http://vpj.github.io/wallapatta/introduction.html(Wallapatta)>>. I wanted to get into svbtle when <<http://dcurt.is/codename-svbtle(Dustin started it)>>, and got invite a little before they opened it to the public. And it's sad to part ways. >>> "Wallapatta" is a <<http://www.dwc.gov.lk/index.php/en/wildlife-news1/228-walla-patta-gyrinops-walla-the-tree-to-preserv(tree in Sri Lanka)>>, that contains <<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agarwood(Agarwood)>>. Wallapatta is a <<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Markdown(Markdown)>> like syntax that can create documents with layouts inspired by handouts of Edward R. Tufte^^1^^. We created it to use for documents. The two great things about Wallapatta is that it creates documents with **sidenotes** and **create print frindly documents** - <<http://vpj.github.io/wallapatta/introduction.html(Wallapatta editor)>> creates print layouts with intelligent page breaks by trying not to place breaks at middle of content like most word processing software do. >>> ^^1^^ <<http://www.edwardtufte.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=0000hB (Book design: advice and examples - edwardtufte.com)>> I built in a simple blog generator into Wallapatta, for personal use. But it's super easy for anyone who wants to give it a go. ###How to start a Wallapatta blog? >>> <<< <iframe src="https://ghbtns.com/github-btn.html?user=vpj&repo=wallapatta&type=star&count=true&size=large" frameborder="0" scrolling="0" width="160px" height="30px"></iframe> It's pretty easy. - **Install <<https://nodejs.org/(Node.js>> NPM usually comes with Node.js. Visit <<https://nodejs.org/>> and see installation instructions. It's usually a download and install, unless you want it installed through a package manager like ``brew``. - **Install <<https://www.npmjs.com/package/wallapatta(Wallapatta node odule>> Run the following command in command line. ``` npm install wallapatta -g That's it and you have wallapatta installed. - **Fork the <<https://github.com/vpj/wallapatta-blog-boilerplate(boilerplate)>> Make a fork of the git repositors on github: <<https://github.com/vpj/wallapatta-blog-boilerplate>> This repo contains this blog post, and 3 empty blog posts, a configuration file and templates for blog. Edit ``templates/post.coffee`` to change the post template and ``templates/blog.coffee`` to change the blog template. Compile these <<http://coffeescript.org/(coffeescript>> code to javascript by running ``coffee -c *``. You will have to change the name of the blog, which is "Varuna Jayasiri" in the two tamplate files. And also the Google Analytics code. Change ``blog.yaml`` to edit blog configurations like the order of posts, post titles, dates, etc. - **Generate the blog ``` wallapatta --blog blog.yaml --output [output_directory] --static The above command will create the html files on the ``output_directory`` provided. ``--static`` specifies that it should copy Wallapatta rendering tools to the folder. (You can omit this if you change the templates to get these from a CDN). ``blog.css`` file on the boilerplate repository contains some css. This file is used in default templates. So you need to copy them to the ``output_directory``. - **That is it! ###What is Wallapatta syntax? It looks like this. ``` ###Heading 1 Introduction to **Heading 1** * Point one Description about point one * Point two ####Subtopic Subtopic content This belongs to Heading 1 >>> ###Heading 1 Introduction to **Heading 1** * Point one Description about point one * Point two ####Subtopic Subtopic content This belongs to Heading 1 It uses indentation to identify what belong where. Indentation is required for specifying content for components like lists, code blocks, special blocks, etc as well. So it's more of a programmer friendly syntax. Indentation helps while working with large documents because you can do stuff like **code folding**. We've changed some of the syntax from Markdown; for instance, ``<<`` and ``>>`` are used for links instead of ``[]()``, because we felt that it's a little more intuitive due to its resemblence with HTML tags. <<http://vpj.github.io/wallapatta/reference.html(Read the Wallapatta reference)>> for a detailed description on each component, including examples for usage.