Migrating the website to Jekyll
Learned Words has had many problems on a standalone WordPress installation, with its media library consistently going missing. That's one of the reasons I am moving the site to Jekyll.
WordPress used to be a lot more stable years ago, when there were fewer plugins and add-ons, and bits and bobs to make it upset. I’ve had a terrible time with it recently - the images, PDF files and other items in the media library keep going missing! Or rather, they files are still there, at the same links. But you can’t get to them from the front of the website.
It’s very strange.
Why leave Wordpress?
Because …
- the Wordpress image/media library constantly forgets that I’ve uploaded images and loses the files.
- there is little control over cookies (and thus is a GDPR risk).
- the analytics in Wordpress may or may not also violate the GDPR.
- I want to author on my local machine, not over an internet connection.
- the stability of externally hosted databases are not guaranteed.
- it’s easier to backup text in a Jekyll site on my local computer.
- Jekyll is open source software, and I like that.
- it’s faster to write in Markdown than in the Wordpress editor.
- it can be read more easily with screen readers - more accessible.
- the pages look better in Safari’s reader.
Better security and privacy
With a static site, such as one built with Jekyll - there is no log in. No cookies being set for administrators. And hopefully there are fewer ways you can break a website’s security by adding URL modifiers.
No cookies means I don’t have to display that cookie banner (YAY) that is mandatory because of the GDPR. I couldn’t find a non-subscription plugin for Wordpress to do this, so it was another impetus to get away and use a static site.
Back to coding by hand?
Sort of … I find writing in Markdown much easier. I can focus on just the content, and then add in images or formatting as I finish. That means I write faster - a good thing!
But the migration itself will take some time. I’m transferring each page and blog post and updating things as I go. It’ll take some time to get through 100+ pages and posts!
It has meant a lot of tweaking on the back end, reinstalling Ruby, updating gems and the development environment, rewriting/relinking content, customising scripts, fixing bugs in Jekyll templates, …
If you find anything else is broken, please have patience - I’ll be fixing things as my energy allows.
Update: It’s live! Please let me know if you find anything broken.