Setting up a blog with Hexo using GitHub Pages

Introduction

This articles will show you how to setup a blog with Hexo, a blog framework built with Node.js, and publish it to GitHub.

Setting up Hexo and host it in GitHub

Dependencies

1. Node.js https://nodejs.org
2. Git Bash https://git-scm.com or others git tools available online

Install Hexo

1. Install Hexo, run the following command in git-bash

   cd /your hexo directory/
   npm install hexo-cli -g

   make sure you included the npm directory in your PATH variable

   ;C:\Program Files\nodejs\node_modules\npm
   

2. Once Hexo is installed, initialize Hexo

   $ hexo init

   following files will be created

   .
   ├── _config.yml
   ├── package.json
   ├── scaffolds
   ├── source
   |   ├── _drafts
   |   └── _posts
   └── themes
   

3. The site is then ready for deploy

Start Hexo in local environment

• After installing Hexo, you might want to have a look of the website, you can run the following command

  $ hexo server

• Server will be started and it can be accessed by using http://localhost:4000

Generate static files

• Generating static files with the following command

  $ hexo generate

Deploy to GitHub Pages

1. create a new github repository with name (you github username).github.io

2. update global setting of hexo _config.yml

   deploy:
     type: git
     repo: link to your github repository

3. Then run the following command to deploy your Hexo site to gitHub

   $ hexo deploy

4. you will be able you visit the site with http://(you github username).github.io

---

Usage

Adding a new post

1. Run the following command

   $ hexo new post "My First Blog Post"

2. start blogging by editing the newly created markdown file in <Hexo directory>/source/_posts

3. regenerate the static files

4. deploy the changes to remote server if needed

Deleting an existing post

1. remove the unwanted post in <Hexo directory>/source/_posts

References

1. Hexo http://hexo.io
2. GitHub Pages https://pages.github.com