Jekyll2021-07-28T09:46:17-07:00https://aaronthayer.net/feed.xmlAaron ThayerA PDX-based technical writer's portfolio and blog haphazardly designed with Jekyll.Aaron ThayerWrite the Docs PDX 2021: Main Stage, Day 2 Recap2021-04-29T10:00:00-07:002021-04-29T10:00:00-07:00https://aaronthayer.net/blog/wtd-2021-day-2-recap<p>I offer applause for, bows to and tips-of-the-hat toward the splendiferous WTD organizers.</p>
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<img src="/assets/images/wtd-2021/wtd-day-2-nicola-yap.png" alt="Nicola Yap's presentation on tech writer onboarding" /><figcaption>
Screencap of a fantastic talk by Nicola Yap on tech writer onboarding.
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<p>It was a resounding success across both main stage days. My first all-digital conference went very well. And despite the obvious drawbacks being remote, it still felt like WTD.</p>
<hr />
<h1 id="day-2-recap">Day 2 recap</h1>
<ul>
<li>
<p><strong>Reward your contributors, then reward them again</strong>. While I’m not working in open-source software (OSS), <a href="https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2021/speakers/#speaker-laura-novich">Laura Novich</a> offered this sage advice. Rewards should be meaningful, personal, consistent, global (i.e., applicable to every geography as well as gender neutral), and tiered. Whether that’s a t-shirt or a forum badge, give your rewards a lot of thought!</p>
</li>
<li>
<p><strong>Style guides: build with what you already have</strong>. Absolutely loved this hard <a href="https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2021/speakers/#speaker-deanna-thompson">lesson learned from Deanna Thompson</a>. My team put a lot of work into our own guide last year. We burned a lot of cycles debating the output. In the end, we kept the content inside Confluence, our <em>tool du jour</em>.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p><strong>Guild run: doc style.</strong> <a href="https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2021/speakers/#speaker-falon-darville">Falon Darville</a> made similar points about imperfection and incompleteness that Daniele Procida made on <a href="https://aaronthayer.net/blog/wtd-2021-day-1-recap/">day one</a>. These two talks together got my mind racing. Documentation is organic, Falon argued, and the act of description rather than limitation. We can impede doc growth by over-prescribing a plan or structure. Also embedded were strategies to grow more friends of the docs in your organization. I liked Falon’s Tech Doc Guild Falon idea made up of key collaborators. Docs should have room to breathe among those who actually give a shit about content.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p><strong>Write instructions that sell products</strong>. Ryan Macklin’s lightning talk stuck with me long past his five-minute limit. A former board game designer turned tech writer, Ryan brought a unique perspective. While I often try and maintain the firewall between <em>tech</em> docs and <em>product</em> docs (there <strong>is</strong> a difference!), he’s not wrong. So what if your doc toolchain is the coolest, most-cutting-edge? If it doesn’t match the needs of the user then you’re not helping reduce client churn. As he noted, board game rulesets are often make-or-break for buyers. If the instructions are obtuse, it’s likely they won’t play your current or future titles.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p><strong>Tech writers need onboarding too</strong>. That’s an obvious statement, right? But as <a href="https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2021/speakers/#speaker-nicola-yap">Nicola Yap detailed</a>, even massive companies like Google can sweep technical writing under the rug. Nicola spearheaded a successful expansion and of proper onboarding to new Google documentarians. There’s too much good stuff to summarize here, so I recommend checking out the full recording when it goes live next week on the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCr019846MitZUEhc6apDdcQ">WTD YouTube channel</a>. In the meantime, <a href="https://github.com/google/opendocs/tree/main/onboarding">Nicola graciously shared the open source onboarding toolkit over at GitHub</a>.</p>
</li>
</ul>
<p>That’s all for this year’s Portland conference. Looking forward to 2021. If we all continue to do our part during the pandemic, maybe the 2022 event can be in person again.</p>
<p>Quick plug: <a href="https://github.com/a-thay/WTD-2021">Raw notes from both days of stage presentations are available at my GitHub page</a>.</p>
<p>Cheers!</p>Aaron ThayerI offer applause for, bows to and tips-of-the-hat toward the splendiferous WTD organizers.Write the Docs PDX 2021: Main Stage, Day 1 Recap2021-04-27T13:00:00-07:002021-04-27T13:00:00-07:00https://aaronthayer.net/blog/wtd-2021-day-1-recap<p>It feels great to be back at a Write the Docs event.</p>
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<img src="/assets/images/wtd-2021/remotesetup.jpg" alt="My WTD 2021 setup" /><figcaption>
My WTD 2021 setup, from my wife’s childhood room.
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<h1 id="the-kick-off">The kick off</h1>
<p>Write the Docs co-founder Eric Holscher was on hand to nervously welcome everyone. He honed his message of community and mandating an inclusive spirit since WTD 2019. Which matters: We’ve all born witness to the end result of systemic hate over the last year. WTD should always be a safe place for all.</p>
<h1 id="paid-support-makes-sense-to-me">Paid support? Makes sense to me!</h1>
<p>It’s unsurprising that Eric and team are considering paid subscriptions to WTD.</p>
<p>Most of what makes the community great would remain free (like the Slack channel). The Herculean effort to manage overhead on ticket sales alone is worth emphasizing.</p>
<p>An optional, paid user base of dedicated members with the means to help keep the lights on is a prudent idea. And I bet there are enough of us documentarians who love this community to open their wallets. Keeping WTD around for the foreseeable future is reward enough.</p>
<hr />
<h1 id="day-1-recap">Day 1 recap</h1>
<p>Below is my brief, bulleted summary of the first day. All around excellent content.</p>
<ul>
<li>
<p><strong>Always remember that it’s someone’s first time performing a technical action</strong>. A salient point from <a href="https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2021/speakers/#speaker-jessica-garson">Jessica Garson’s talk</a> on tutorials. We can lose sight of this when working on a doc set for admins and there are thousands of existing pages.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p><strong>Throw out your perfect plan</strong>. <a href="https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2021/speakers/#speaker-daniele-procida">By far one of the best talks this year was from Daniele Procida</a>. Why not organically write and create documentation? Docs are perfect organisms at all levels of completeness, like a plant or tadpole at each stage of growth. And there’s no such thing as complete. A controversial idea to management, PMs, and SMEs. His points resonated with the virtual audience: many cheers/hurrahs/words of praise. I plan to go over this presentation with my colleagues ASAP.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p><strong>Your doc strategy doesn’t happen: it matures</strong>. <a href="https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2021/speakers/#speaker-sarah-r-rodlund">Sarah R. Rodlund</a> suggests using maturity models to frame your processes. I’m not familiar with these models in my day-to-day. But as someone who’s working on content strategy, I need to fill in the gaps here.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p><strong>Don’t fear the API</strong>. <a href="https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2021/speakers/#speaker-rachael-stavchansky">Be fearless, says Rachel Stavchansky</a>, when staring down the barrel of an API doc project. Your job is to help developers figure out what to do, why they should do it, and how to go about it. It doesn’t take an expert to be audacious and jump in.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p><strong>DOCX is XML? Vectors too</strong>? Many attendees typed “duh” when <a href="https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2021/speakers/#speaker-swapnil-ogale">Swapnil Ogale reminded us</a> that you can edit a Word .docx file in a basic text editor. The underlying content is XML! You can even do it with vector graphics. I’m filing away his talk for the future.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p><strong>Libraries are cool, of course</strong>. An amazing, fun presentation to end the day. Dr. Buttfield-Addison walked us through the history of libraries and library science. Interesting stuff that <a href="https://hey.paris">I recommend following up on at his website</a>.</p>
</li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Update 4/28/21</strong></p>
<ul>
<li>Here’s a <a href="https://github.com/a-thay/WTD-2021">link to my repo of raw conference notes</a>, if you’re so inclined. Thanks!</li>
</ul>Aaron ThayerIt feels great to be back at a Write the Docs event.Write the Docs PDX 2021: Back in the Saddle2021-04-26T09:58:00-07:002021-04-26T09:58:00-07:00https://aaronthayer.net/blog/wtd-back-in-the-saddle<p>After a couple of eventful years away from my professional site and <a href="https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2021/">Write the Docs PDX</a>, I’m eager to get back to learning and sharing!</p>
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<p>I also have several security and vulnerability bugs to squash in my Jekyll setup. (Whoops.)</p>
<p>A quick, personal post before the <a href="https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2021/schedule/">main stage</a> opens up this morning.</p>
<p>Despite my desire to, I skipped Sunday’s Writing Day activities. I actually would have loved to see faces and revel in the company of like-minded attendees.</p>
<p>My excuse this year (having skipped the 2020 conference) comes down to: parent stuff. This year’s WTD coincided with a long-planned drive south to the bay area to see the in-laws. My wife and I haven’t been back since August 2019, a few months before our son was born. We’re both (partially) vaccinated and have quarantined since the pandemic began. The grandparents are fully vaccinated and also make very few outings beyond necessities. We felt it was “safe enough,” knowing we can’t control or prevent all risk. We weighed that against our 1.5-year-old toddler not seeing family or the world more than two hours away. I understand those who wouldn’t, or couldn’t, make the same decision.</p>
<p>That’s the extent of my pre-recipe, life story blogger introduction. I’ll be posting after the end of each main stage conference day with my impressions and thoughts on the day’s talks. Looking forward to another jam-packed WTD PDX. Cheers!</p>
<p><strong>Update 4/28/21</strong></p>
<ul>
<li>Here’s a <a href="https://github.com/a-thay/WTD-2021">link to my repo of raw conference notes</a>, if you’re so inclined. Thanks!</li>
</ul>Aaron ThayerAfter a couple of eventful years away from my professional site and Write the Docs PDX, I’m eager to get back to learning and sharing!WTD PDX 2019 - Day 2 Recap2019-05-21T20:00:00-07:002019-05-21T20:00:00-07:00https://aaronthayer.net/blog/wtd-day-2-recap<p>I couldn’t be happier that my first professional conference was <a href="https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2019/">Write the Docs</a>.</p>
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<img src="/assets/images/wtd-header-swag.jpg" alt="WTD PDX 2019 swag!" /><figcaption>
Sweet, sweet swag. Image courtesy Write the Docs: https://flic.kr/p/25kBkHv
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<p><em>Catch up on Day 1 in my <a href="/blog/wtd-day-1-recap/">previous recap</a>.</em></p>
<p>A big thank you to the WTD organizers and presenters. Everyone cares so much about documentation, which is still a welcome shock. I can’t wait to come back in 2020.</p>
<p>To everyone I met: Hello! Let’s keep in touch.</p>
<p>My recap follows below. Enjoy.</p>
<h1 id="day-2-recap">Day 2 Recap</h1>
<ul>
<li><strong>Include the end user!</strong> The (spoken) truth: docs are better when users contribute to the breadth, depth and end product of the documentation pipeline. Speakers alluded to tracking and analyzing users. They’re right. You’re throwing work at the wall and hoping it sticks if you don’t keep close tabs on what users need and want.</li>
<li><strong>That said, analytics are hard.</strong> Sarah Moir’s <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5kTWjB28TDI&list=PLZAeFn6dfHpmuHCu5qsIkmp9H5jFD-xq-&index=18&t=0s">excellent talk</a> on using data to rank your backlog hit home for me. I’m relaunching Google Analytics for our Confluence-based doc portal at work. And even the data-confident Sarah spoke to the parsing potholes when dealing with a ton of sources. Focus and narrative are key. It’s nice to know the difficulty curve isn’t my experience alone.</li>
<li><strong>I’m not an “impostor.”</strong> This sounds obvious, but I’m still new to the discipline. Also, being a lone tech writer for four years was demoralizing. When I came across Tom Johnson’s <a href="https://idratherbewriting.com/">I’d Rather Be Writing</a>, I admired that he “got” tech writing. But I also felt intimidated by his level of knowledge and breadth of experience. “I can’t do what he does,” I told myself. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impostor_syndrome">Impostor syndrome</a> is a real, awful feeling. (Note: As a white, straight and cisgender male, my ‘outsider’ experience =/= the extra levels of anxiety and pressure marginalized groups face in this industry.) I again felt admiration and self-deprecation when I joined the WTD Slack. I read the chats of so many smart documentarians I assumed I didn’t belong. But the conference reinforced the truth that we each struggle. WTD PDX relieved some of my anxiety and opened me to the sincerity of this community. People know where you’ve been, and they’re happy to help you along the way.</li>
<li><strong>Take the elevator sometimes.</strong> Business cases aren’t my favorite activity. I get they’re necessary, but that doesn’t mean I love writing one. One salient piece of advice I took away from Matt Reiner’s energetic <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ZPUOwBIi3g&list=PLZAeFn6dfHpmuHCu5qsIkmp9H5jFD-xq-&index=19&t=0s">talk on business cases</a> is to work on your elevator pitch. I’m loathe to admit that he’s right, only because that means I have to force myself to hone that skill. The truth is, if you can’t present your “why” in a brief ride up a few floors, you haven’t done the work. Go back to the drawing board, friend.</li>
<li><strong>“Strategery” is also hard, but invaluable.</strong> Kay Miles killed it discussing information architecture and content strategy. <a href="https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2019/speakers/#speaker-portland-2019-kay-miles">Her talk</a> reminded those of us who think strategically about content that we have long, exhausting battles to fight. As Kay said, to win you have to: (1) fix the root cause; (2) be consistent; (3) be Google and offer relevant, mind-reading search returns. If you aren’t solving content issues at the root, those ugly doc weeds will keep sprouting by the dozens.</li>
<li><strong>Open source seems cool, right?</strong> This is a lazy point for me to make, but yes, open source is rad. I left WTD more than a bit envious. So many documentarians shared their success stories deploying effective, efficient and capable docs for open source products. I don’t work in that world, but it’s something I intend to keep my eye on as I dive deeper into docs-as-code.</li>
</ul>
<p>If you’re at all interested in WTD but couldn’t attend the PDX conference, I recommend checking out the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCr019846MitZUEhc6apDdcQ">WTD YouTube channel</a>. The amazing team posted most of the talks from the last two days, and there are previous conference talks available, too!</p>
<p>Reminder: all my WTD PDX 2019 notes are on GitHub via my <a href="https://github.com/a-thay/WTD-2019">WTD-2019 repo</a>.</p>Aaron ThayerI couldn’t be happier that my first professional conference was Write the Docs.WTD PDX 2019 - Day 1 Recap2019-05-20T18:00:00-07:002019-05-20T18:00:00-07:00https://aaronthayer.net/blog/wtd-day-1-recap<p>What a whirlwind first day!</p>
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<img src="/assets/images/wtd-pdx-2019-group.jpg" alt="The WTD PDX 2019 crew" /><figcaption>
WTD PDX 2019. Image courtesy Write the Docs: https://flic.kr/p/2fTHLiN
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<p>I mentioned in my <a href="/blog/preparing-for-WTD-2019/">previous post</a> that this is my inaugural <a href="https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2019/">Write the Docs</a> conference. The last ~12 hours have been a blast, and I’m ready for day two tomorrow.</p>
<p>Below is my brief recap. I have a lot more to process, but the following points came to mind as I mull everything over at home.</p>
<h1 id="day-1-recap">Day 1 Recap</h1>
<ul>
<li><strong>We’re all in it together.</strong> Everyone at WTD struggles with: analytics, delivering AND soliciting feedback, knowing the end user, writing without complexity, and content siloing.</li>
<li><strong>Exceptional conference scheduling.</strong> WTD does a very good job of keeping the schedule moving and on-time. We started and ended according to schedule.</li>
<li><strong>Effortless networking? It can happen to you!</strong> Sitting at a “round table” is the best way to network without feeling like it’s a burden. I got to know almost everyone at my table, and we sat together the entire day. Now the trick is keeping in touch with these colleagues in the WTD Slack and/or LinkedIn.</li>
<li><strong>So many well-timed breaks.</strong> 10-20 minute breaks between talks is awesome, smart, and, well, awesome.</li>
<li><strong>Editing got several (welcomed) shoutouts.</strong> From Ingrid Towey’s “How to edit other people’s content without pissing them off” to Kathleen Juell’s “Writer? Editor? Teacher?” the message was clear: collaborative, respectful editing necessitates clarity, context and reasoning. It’s not enough to mark an error and hope someone understands. We can only build better writers by offering explanations and reasoning! But, we must also avoid editing per our tastes, and ensure consistency via style guides and the like.</li>
<li><strong>Something inspiring: in-person group editing.</strong> The concept of in-person editing sessions came up many times. That seems hard to do with remote teams in different time zones. But the idea of being together to collaboratively answer “what is this doc’s purpose, who is it for?” to better target content to end users is a valid concept worth exploring.</li>
<li><strong>Open source isn’t so scary after all.</strong> Don’t be afraid to jump into open source contributions! And if you find it overwhelming, create your own open source project. Even if it’s a simple app, there’s an eagerness within the community to contribute. But templatize the work as much as possible before juggling mass-PR insanity.</li>
</ul>
<p>I’m posting all my notes on GitHub in my <a href="https://github.com/a-thay/WTD-2019">WTD-2019 repo</a>. Check it out if you’d like more detailed information about the first day.</p>Aaron ThayerWhat a whirlwind first day!Preparing for Write the Docs PDX 20192019-05-18T08:44:00-07:002019-05-18T08:44:00-07:00https://aaronthayer.net/blog/preparing-for-WTD-2019<p>The annual <a href="https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2019/">Write the Docs PDX</a> conference begins this Sunday. I’m beyond excited!</p>
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<p>It’s my first time attending. A year ago, I didn’t even know WTD existed! Since discovering this amazing tech writer/documentarian community, I’ve joined the <a href="https://www.writethedocs.org/slack/">Slack channel</a> and convinced my company to pay for my ticket.</p>
<p>I’m ready. A little anxious, but eager. I’ll do my best to absorb every talk, but I admit right now I’m a pretty average networker. Over the years, my shyness has gotten the best of me. But I’m getting better, and I don’t want to miss this opportunity to grow my career and join the larger community.</p>
<p>So. What am I so excited about? Here’s my selection of must-see conference presentations:</p>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2019/speakers/#speaker-portland-2019-mike-jang">How I learned to stop worrying and love the command line</a> by Mike Jang
<ul>
<li>WHY: I first used iTerm on macOS and Command Prompt on Windows like, um, ~8 months ago. I still have a lot to learn.</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li><a href="https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2019/speakers/#speaker-portland-2019-ingrid-towey">How to edit other people’s content without pissing them off</a> by Ingrid Towey
<ul>
<li>WHY: I switched teams at work last fall and went from the sole documentarian to joining a group of seven (!) amazing colleagues. As part of an editorial subgroup, I’ve put on an editor’s hat not worn since my journalism days. There’s always room for additional best practices to professionally, and gracefully, deliver feedback.</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li><a href="https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2019/speakers/#speaker-portland-2019-sarah-moir">Just add data: Make it easier to prioritize your documentation</a> by Sarah Moir
<ul>
<li>WHY: At Smarsh, technical documentation hasn’t been a data-driven pursuit. That’s OK: a lot of doc teams don’t capture data. My manager and I want to change that. I’m already working on a relaunch of our analytics this quarter, so this talk is relevant.</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li><a href="https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2019/speakers/#speaker-portland-2019-matt-reiner">Show me the money: How to get your docs the love and support they deserve</a> by Matt Reiner
<ul>
<li>WHY: Any technical writer knows the pain of advocating for your work and yourself. Every company I’ve worked for, until Smarsh, deprioritized the value of good documentation. Even well-resourced documentation roles always need more. I have to learn more about bolstering support for docs. Did someone say “ROI?”</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li><a href="https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2019/speakers/#speaker-portland-2019-kay-miles">Product documentation strategy: What is it and why do we need it?</a> by Kay Miles
<ul>
<li>WHY: Content strategy, like analytics, is another nebulous topic. Many documentarians have struggled with awful, siloed content in complete disarray. It feels overwhelming to even start thinking about strategy. Strategic content planning is another work project, so this talk piqued my interest.</li>
</ul>
</li>
</ul>
<p>These talks highlight myriad challenges I’ve faced both in and outside of Smarsh. I’m also looking forward to every talk I didn’t list. Check out the <a href="https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2019/schedule/">full schedule</a> if you’re interested.</p>
<p>If you can’t attend, don’t fret. <a href="https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2019/livestream/">WTD streams the conference</a>, which is so wonderful if you missed ticket sales or your expense was denied.</p>
<p>Look for my retrospective/postmortem sometime after the conference wraps Tuesday.</p>Aaron ThayerThe annual Write the Docs PDX conference begins this Sunday. I’m beyond excited!Why hello there!2018-09-14T10:00:00-07:002018-09-14T10:00:00-07:00https://aaronthayer.net/blog/why-hello-there<p>Welcome!</p>
<p>This is the first post of my redesigned site.</p>
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<p>It’s been quite an ordeal, but a rewarding one!</p>
<p>How did I get here? Well, I had to ask myself a lot of questions. The answers to which I can now provide…myself.</p>
<p><strong>Q: How do I stop paying a ton of money to host a basic website?</strong></p>
<ul>
<li>Pay for a domain, but <a href="https://pages.github.com/">host for free through GitHub Pages</a>.</li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Q: How do I transfer my domain to a new registrar?</strong></p>
<ul>
<li>Browse your new registrar’s <a href="https://www.namecheap.com/support/knowledgebase.aspx">knowledgebase</a>!</li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Q: How (the hell) do I build a website from scratch these days?</strong></p>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://jekyllrb.com/">Learn a new language</a>—especially one that <a href="https://idratherbewriting.com/2015/04/15/final-analysis-between-dita-and-jekyll/">might help your technical writing career</a>.</li>
<li>Download <a href="https://atom.io/">Atom</a>. Be fortunate enough to <a href="http://https://www.linkedin.com/in/bkryer/">have a patient colleague show you the ropes</a>.</li>
<li>Alternatively, <a href="https://flight-manual.atom.io/">read the Atom Flight Manual</a>.</li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Q: Cool stuff. But what the hell is Jekyll? What’s a gem?</strong></p>
<ul>
<li>Yeah, that stuff is confusing. <a href="https://jekyllrb.com/tutorials/video-walkthroughs/">Keep</a> <a href="https://github.com/rbenv/rbenv#homebrew-on-macos">at</a> <a href="http://jmcglone.com/guides/github-pages/">it</a>, <a href="https://stackoverflow.com/questions/35031998/prepending-bundle-exec-to-your-command-may-solve-this-rails">dude</a>. (Oh, and try not to fuck with Ruby on both Windows and macOS before you know what you’re doing. Or do, but I hope you have a stress reliever handy. <a href="https://gist.github.com/jirutka/99d57c82fa8981f56fb5">Know</a> and <a href="https://macpaw.com/how-to/use-terminal-on-mac">love</a> your terminal.)</li>
<li>Once your migraine has stopped, install Ruby and Git to your machine. <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T1itpPvFWHI&list=PLLAZ4kZ9dFpOPV5C5Ay0pHaa0RJFhcmcB">Follow Mike Dane’s Jekyll tutorials</a> to get a basic blog template running locally.</li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Q: OK, I think I get it. I can run a local server of my Jekyll site (!), but how do I push it to GitHub? (Also, please explain what a Git is.)</strong></p>
<ul>
<li>Oh boy. Start with <a href="https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Getting-Started-Git-Basics">a basic understanding of Git</a>. GitHub’s “Hello World” tutorial <a href="https://guides.github.com/activities/hello-world/">is a huge help</a>. You’ll learn about branches, forking, inits, pull requests and repos.</li>
<li>Feeling accomplished? Use the GitHub Pages crash course to <a href="https://pages.github.com/">create your first GitHub-hosted website</a>.</li>
<li>Then, follow your registrar’s documentation to <a href="https://www.namecheap.com/support/knowledgebase/article.aspx/9645/2208/how-do-i-link-my-domain-to-github-pages">create a CNAME file for your domain in your GitHub repo while also creating A Records in your DNS settings to link GitHub to your domain</a>. (Wow! I can’t believe how jargony and cool you just sounded! [Right? I’m really impressed with us!])</li>
</ul>
<p>Now would you believe, even after all that work, this website isn’t even <em>close</em> to being done? It’s not.</p>
<p>After these numerous, but small, victories, I need to:</p>
<ul>
<li>Redesign the blog. The stock template isn’t doing it for me.</li>
<li>Add content. You know: my resume, my portfolio—the fun stuff.</li>
<li>Figure out how to post my photographs. I want to use this site to show off!</li>
</ul>
<p>I’ll keep updating as I make progress on the above. I’m doing this to learn as much as I can about development without actually becoming a developer.</p>
<p>Thanks for reading! You won’t find me on social media (yeah, you literally can’t @ me), but you can always see what I’m up to over at <a href="https://www.siliconsasquatch.com/">Silicon Sasquatch</a>.</p>
<p>– Aaron</p>Aaron ThayerWelcome! This is the first post of my redesigned site.