As you can probably tell, this blog is hosted on GitHub Pages and rendered using Jekyll. This means you can find the source in its dedicated GitHub repository.

Why didn’t I write my own blogging engine? For a few reasons:

  1. I have worked on a blogging engine (DasBlog) in the past.
  2. There are many great existing blogging platforms available and actively maintained.
  3. Hosting on GitHub Pages is free.

The first two reasons are the most important and reflect my philosophy in software development:

Only work on projects that you find interesting and on which you can have a meaningful impact.

My time is limited, and I have many things I want to do—travel, ski, watch movies, read books. So, I don’t want to work on things in my spare time that feel like work. That’s why I chose my projects deliberately.

I use an unscientific method to prioritize projects, partially based on vibes. I rate every project on the following axes using 1-5 stars (⭐):

  • Does it uniquely help me learn something?
  • Do I find it interesting?
  • Can I contribute something significant to the existing ecosystem?
  • Does it help my community, my friends, my partner, my family?
  • Does it make me money?

And at least 3 of the axes should have more than 4 stars for me to consider working on a project.

Creating my own custom blogging platform doesn’t meet that bar, it scores low (1, maybe 2 stars) on every category. The only category I could argue for a higher rating is that it could potentially help me learn about React server-side rendering or generating a static website using templates. However, that’s not something I’m currently interested in.