After 9 years of using WordPress, I’ve finally decided to use another hosting. This time not just a new host/server but actually another technology to host my blog.

Github Pages allows you to host a static pages based blog. You have complete version control/history, but no overhead any more from php/mysql.

Tools

• Disqus: For still allowing comments, has a plugin for WordPress (Disqus Comment System) to move existing comments.
• WordPress to Jekyll Exporter: Exports all posts/pages and converts them to markdown files for Jekyll.
• PortableJekyll: the portable version contains everything which is required to run Jekyll v2.3 on Windows.
• Github Windows: Git GUI client for Windows.

Usage

Having the Jekyll for Windows allows you to run your blog locally (jekyll serve –watch) so that you can test before pushing. This was very useful as all the used tools were new for me, yaml config files, jekyll templating, markdown posts.