Starting From Experience

  • February 23, 2025
  • General
  • Reading time: 3 minutes

Starting a simple but actual blog in the year of 2025. I've been on the internet since 2003—maybe even 2002 actually—and going back to the roots of simple weblogging.

Whether anyone would read it or not.

Starting from Experience

I recently heard this from an Instagram reel. In summary, if you've already done a lot, and you've had to rebuild multiple times due to a multitude of reasons, you're not really starting from scratch—you're starting from experience. And well, I've been blogging since 2003, and used a multitude of blogging platforms outside of Livejournal: Blogger, Pitas, Expression Engine, b2/cafelog, then WordPress. Setting up my own blogs is how I learned web development, which actually kicked off my whole career. And going back to blogging now... yep. I'm starting from experience.

Why try out a new CMS?

With this new setup, decided I hit two targets in one go by trying out a new CMS, Grav. I've been leaning towards a flat file setup for not-so complicated things. I've already tried out Bludit for Sakura Tower, and just wanted to try something new. Now if I already have Bludit, why try something else? Partly to get my brain working with trying new things. The other is just trying to go back to blogging, simply. Especially when the Great Social Media Experiment has crashed and burned. And we're all split up into groups now. And hoping just to plant a small piece of my self in this wide expansive world wide web, and maybe found. For now. We're setting up our plot of words here, and bear with me as I try to make sense of my ramblings.

Apologies in advance if my thoughts here are run-on.

And exactly why new CMSes? Because well... things have not been going well in the WP system.

First impressions

Grav is not as straightforward as Bludit, in terms of a flat file CMS. The configuration is also not as straightforward as WordPress, as there's not a lot of settings out of the box. It's not "up and running" after a few simple clicks. I had to be able to choose the right skeleton and install the admin plugin separately. Yes, separately. There's a download where the core and admin plugin has already been included. But I wanted a download with a skeleton already—meaning one that has the configuration for a blog setup already.

In terms of setting up a simple blog? I much prefer Bludit in this, but then again I already have two sites under my belt with that.

But I'm pausing development for now, and just settle in. Kind of like moving in with just a few boxes of my things, and sitting on the lone chair while I figure this new space out. In the next month(s?) or so—heaven knows how long it takes me to work on personal projects nowadays—things here might change; layout, colors, functionalities. But for now, Asides is This.

Welcome, and I'll get you some coffee once I unpack my things.