Publishing with One Command: render, commit, push

Publishing by hand means the same four steps every time: render, check, commit, push. publish.sh does them in one line.

Daily Use

./publish.sh posts/my-new-post.qmd                  # one post
./publish.sh posts/a.qmd posts/b.qmd                # several posts
./publish.sh --all                                  # whole site
./publish.sh -m "Add the tags post" posts/tags.qmd  # custom commit message
./publish.sh --no-push posts/draft.qmd              # render and commit, look first

With no arguments it skips rendering and just refreshes the data file, then commits and pushes whatever is pending.

What the Script Does

1. Finds the Quarto project (the folder with _quarto.yml).
2. Renders each file you name. quarto render takes one file per call, so the script loops.
3. Stages the project folder only, so unrelated changes elsewhere in the repository are left alone.
4. Stops if a render fails, and skips the commit when nothing changed.
5. Runs git pull --rebase --autostash and then git push.

Why One Post Is Enough

Blogkit rebuilds its data file on every render, even of a single post. The archive, tags and related posts on all other pages read from that file in the browser, so you never have to re-render the whole site after adding one post. A full --all render is only needed after you change the theme, the stylesheet’s structure or _quarto.yml.

Setting Up GitHub Pages

The sample project builds into docs/. In your repository go to Settings, Pages, choose the main branch and the /docs folder. Because the built HTML is committed, GitHub needs no build step and Quarto does not have to be installed there.

Preview Before You Push

cd docs
python3 -m http.server 8000     # then open http://localhost:8000

Use a hard refresh so the browser does not show stale files. If you like changing things first and publishing later, see Customising the Theme.