New Kooky Photograhy Home

I just helped move a site, and it seems to have gone well. The site in question is Kooky Photography, a site where a talented photographer displays her work, and it has been stable with its new host for a week or so now. I followed this article to migrate it from Linode to Github. The advantage of Github over Linode, of course, is that it is free. Yay

The article explains how to get setup to publish and share a static HTML website on GitHub, which is fine for a photography portfolio site. You simply create a GitHub account, download the GitHub Desktop app and fire it up. Inside the app you create a new GitHub project by creating a new Repository folder.

This folder can, for example, be created in your home folder, and given a name such as "/Sites".

Then you create your GitHub Repository folder within this by clicking the “Create Repository” button. The name of the new repository has to be [username].github.io   - where [username] is your GitHub account username. This way your files display when someone points their browser to: https://[username].github.io/

Populate your shiny new folder by copying your website files to the new Repository folder. Remeber don’t just drag and drop them, actually copy them or you will lose the originals.
Fill in the “Summary” text input, located near the bottom left of the user interface, with something simple like, “My first commit." You can add more details about the commit in the “Description” text box if you want. Then click the “Commit to master” button.

After clicking the “Commit to master” button, you’ll see in the bottom left corner of the GitHub Desktop interface there’s a little indicator that your commit was successful. Under the “Commit to master” button, recent commit messages are displayed, each with an “Undo” button to undo the recent commit.

 Then, find the “Publish repository” button along the top of the GitHub Desktop interface. All the options in the form are fine as-is except the “Keep this code private” checkbox; this needs to be unchecked in order for you to share your site with the world. Now, in your browser, go to your new GitHub repository page to make sure your files made the journey to their new home:

https://github.com/[username]/[username].github.io

Or go directly to check out your website in your browser.

https://[username].github.io/

Next I had to point my GoDaddy domain at Github, which is a confusing process, but luckily there was a web page that walks you through this process, too. This is all a convoluted series of steps, to be sure, but free hosting is not to be sniffed at, and it works just fine for a website with static HTML pages, like Kooky Photography.

To end, just a reminder that the best way to support this blog is to buy one of my books. Simply go over to Amazon, or Kobo and get one.