Death to GoDaddy

GoDaddy sent me a Web Hosting Deluxe Renewal reminder (very courteous of them). It was for $839.40/5yrs. I decided that was too much for a pretty much useless site. I considered downgrading to the “Standard” hosting plan for $5/mo but couldn’t justify it. The nice thing was that the old site had been up a while and I got somewhat used to the wordpress content management scheme. But its time as passed, over 12 or 13 years since the first post on that site.

I was willing to explore some free1 replacement options as I’ve come to learn how to use computers a bit better over the years, and I feel like I can get pretty dangerous with new things pretty quickly thanks to the LLMs.

Now What?

As is my go-to for everything these days, I sought wisdom from ChatGPT. It provided me 8 recommendations to my poorly worded and conceived prompt:

What are options for free, modern, professional website options for hosting project portfolios? I have used things like google sites and currently pay for Wordpress hosting but am looking to understand the other options that exist today.

There are several options available for creating and hosting modern, professional-looking project portfolios for free. Here are some popular ones:

  1. GitHub Pages:

    • Description: Ideal for developers, GitHub Pages allows you to host static websites directly from a GitHub repository. You can use Jekyll, a static site generator, to create a professional-looking portfolio.
    • Pros: Free, supports custom domains, integrated with GitHub for version control.
    • Cons: Requires some technical knowledge to set up.

  2. …

  3. …

  4. …

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  8. …

Each of these options has its own strengths and is suited to different levels of technical skill and customization needs. Consider what features are most important to you, such as ease of use, design flexibility, or the ability to use a custom domain, when choosing the best platform for your project portfolio.

So of course I picked the first one.

Where We At

So, here we are. The site is now hosted as a github page on a public repo. We’ve made it - and this post proves it. This was a little bit of a journey - went something like this:

  1. Ask ChatGPT for detailed options for GitHub Pages; take the first option
    1. Explore Jekyll
    2. Realize Jekyll doesn’t really do pictures very well
  2. Decide to opt for Hugo as a new thing; option #2 from ChatGPT
    1. Follow quick start guide and use yucky theme
    2. Switch over to PaperMod… much better.
    3. Start porting over wordpress content.
  3. Realize I don’t actually know what I want the site to be
    1. It turns out that my needs are not the same as when I was in college
    2. Generate some “design criteria” for what the site should be.
  4. …
  5. Profit?

This marks a fresh start for us here, and I’m eager to gradually tidy up the chaos of the internet. The new site will move away from documenting engineering and school-era photo projects, focusing instead on my current side projects and interests. As my passions and resources evolve, so will the content of the site.

Next Steps

I intend to use this platform to chronicle both the mundane and noteworthy side projects and fascinations of the moment. Perhaps I’ll throw in a book review or two, or simply share the latest magic ChatGPT has done at my request… time will tell!

  1. I’m still willing to pay for my domain name… GoDaddy has been solid there and fair at ~$22/yr ↩︎