Today we are going to learn that how to install & create a blog with Hexo on Ubuntu 20.04. Hexo is a static blogging platform built on Node.js. With the help of hexo you can write posts in Markdown format. It converts the blog posts into static HTML files with the help of pre-built themes. It varies from the other blogging softwares as it uses static files instead of loading code again & again when you reload the site. So, here we’ll see that how to install it on your system.
Step 1: Update Your System
As usual we do, update your system to have the latest updates installed.
sudo apt update -y
sudo apt upgrade -y
Then install the required packages by typing
sudo apt install git git config --global user.name "Your Name" git config --global user.email "[email protected]"
Note: Replace your git username, email & domain name.
Step 2: Configure Firewall on Ubuntu 20.04
Allow the firewall access by enabling the SSH port. Don’t forget to enable firewall if you’re installing it for the first time.
sudo ufw enable
Then enable the port 4000 in order to communicate
sudo ufw allow 4000
Make sure to allow http, https & then verify the status of firewall.
sudo ufw allow http
sudo ufw allow https
sudo ufw status
Output:
sabi@Ubuntu20:~$ sudo ufw status Status: active To Action From -- ------ ---- 4000 ALLOW Anywhere 80/tcp ALLOW Anywhere 443/tcp ALLOW Anywhere 4000 (v6) ALLOW Anywhere (v6) 80/tcp (v6) ALLOW Anywhere (v6) 443/tcp (v6) ALLOW Anywhere (v6) sabi@Ubuntu20:~$
Step 3: Install Node.js on Ubuntu 20.04
Hit the below commands to install node.js on Ubuntu 20.04.
curl -sL https://deb.nodesource.com/setup_14.x | sudo -E bash -
sudo apt install nodejs
Verify the installed version
node --version
Step 4: Install Hexo On Ubuntu 20.04
Fire the below command in your terminal to install Hexo on Ubuntu 20.04
sudo npm install hexo-cli -g
Once installed, make a new directory to install Hexo
sudo mkdir -p /var/www/hexo
Give it proper permissions
sudo chown -R $USER:$USER /var/www/hexo
sudo chmod -R 755 /var/www/hexo
Now switch to the hexo directory & initialize it.
cd /var/www/hexo hexo init
INFO Cloning hexo-starter https://github.com/hexojs/hexo-starter.git INFO Install dependencies added 185 packages from 430 contributors and audited 191 packages in 6.47s 14 packages are looking for funding run npm fund for details found 0 vulnerabilities INFO Start blogging with Hexo!
Finally hit the below command to install hexo
npm install
Step 5: Configure Hexo On Ubuntu 20.04
Edit the _config.yml file
sudo nano _config.yml
And then change the name of options according to your needs.
## Hexo Configuration ## Docs: https://hexo.io/docs/configuration.html ## Source: https://github.com/hexojs/hexo/ #Site title: Hexo subtitle: '' description: '' keywords: author: sabi language: en timezone: '' #URL If your site is put in a subdirectory, set url as 'http://example.com/child' and root as '/child/' url: http://example.com root: / permalink: :year/:month/:day/:title/ permalink_defaults: pretty_urls: trailing_index: true # Set to false to remove trailing 'index.html' from permalinks trailing_html: true # Set to false to remove trailing '.html' from permalinks
Note: Provide domain name, URL, site title & other required options & do 2 more changes.
- change default_layout value from post to draft.
- change post_asset_folder variable to true.
Step 6: Install themes For Your Blog
As hexo comes with the default theme, you can change to your favourite them by the hexo Themes page.
Here we’ll install Next theme for testing. To install this first switch to the /var/www/hexo/ directory & download the theme
cd /var/www/hexo
git clone https://github.com/theme-next/hexo-theme-next themes/next
Once downloaded, edit the _config.yml to update your new theme.
sudo nano _config.yml
Do the changes to theme variable in order to install new theme
# Extensions ## Plugins: https://hexo.io/plugins/ ## Themes: https://hexo.io/themes/ theme: next
In order to update the theme settings, change the /var/www/hexo/themes/next/_config.yml file.
Step 7: Create Your First Post
Hit the below command to create your first post.
hexo new first-post
INFO Validating config
INFO Created: /var/www/hexo/source/_drafts/first-post.md
Once created, fire the below command to edit new post.
sudo nano ./source/_drafts/first-post.md
Each post should have it’s own front-master. It constists of title, published date, categories, tags, etc. Update the default details with the accurate one.
title: sabi's First Post tags: test categories: Hexo comments: true date: 2021-01-02 00:00:00 Markdown goes here. **This is our first post!**
To place an image in your post add the below command in your post.
{% asset_img "example.jpg" "This is an example image" %}
Note: Replace example.jpg with your image name & then copy that file to \source_posts\first-post directory.
Then save & exit the file.
Finally publish the post by typing
hexo publish first-post
Step 8: Installing a Plugin For Hexo
Get the plugins for hexo from their hexo plugins page. You can install your favourite one according to your needs. Save the plugin by typing
cd /var/www/hexo
npm i hexo-filter-nofollow --save
Then edit the below file
sudo nano _config.yml
Add the below lines at the end of the above file.
nofollow:
enable: true
field: site
exclude:
- 'exclude1.com'
- 'exclude2.com
enable: To activate the plugin.
field: Explain the scope of the plugin.
exclude: To exclude domains for nofollow links.
Step 9: Testing Hexo Server
Hit the below command to test the hexo server.
hexo server
Then type IP:4000 in browser & you’ll see the welcome page with your post created earlier.
Simply hit Ctrl+C to stop the server.
Step 10: Generate Hexo Static Files
Hit the below command to generate the static files
hexo generate
These files can be found at /var/www/hexo/public. From there, you can server them publically. We’ll use Nginx for this purpose.
Fire the given command to install nginx
sudo apt install nginx
Edit the hexo config file
sudo nano /etc/nginx/sites-available/hexo.conf
Then add the below data into the file.
server {
server_name hexo.example.com;
root /var/www/hexo/public;
index index.html index.htm;
listen 443 ssl http2; listen [::]:443 ssl http2;
ssl_certificate /etc/letsencrypt/live/hexo.example.com/fullchain.pem;
ssl_certificate_key /etc/letsencrypt/live/hexo.example.com/privkey.pem;
ssl_protocols TLSv1.2 TLSv1.3;
ssl_session_timeout 1d;
ssl_session_cache shared:MozSSL:10m;
# about 40000 sessions ssl_session_tickets off;
ssl_ciphers ECDHE-ECDSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256:ECDHE-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256:ECDHE-ECDSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384:ECDHE-RSA-AES25> ssl_prefer_server_ciphers off;
ssl_dhparam /etc/ssl/certs/dhparam.pem;
location / {
try_files $uri $uri/ =404;
}
}
server {
if ($host = hexo.example.com) {
return 301 https://$host$request_uri;
}
server_name hexo.example.com;
listen 80;
listen [::]:80;
return 404;
}
Then save & exit the file.
Link the config file by typing
sudo ln -s /etc/nginx/sites-available/hexo.conf /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/
Next, hit the below command to edit the nginx config file
sudo nano /etc/nginx/nginx.conf
Add the given line before the line include /etc/nginx/conf.d/*.conf
server_names_hash_bucket_size 64;
Update the types_hash_max_size value from 2048-4096
types_hash_max_size 4096;
Save the file & verify the syntax.
sudo nginx -t
And restart nginx
sudo systemctl restart nginx
Step 11: Install SSL For Hexo
Now, install certbot by typing
sudo apt install certbot
Hit the below command to generate the certificates then create a DHParams certificates.
sudo certbot certonly --standalone -d hexo.yourdomain.com --preferred-challenges http --agree-tos -n -m [email protected] --keep-until-expiring sudo systemctl start nginx sudo openssl dhparam -out /etc/ssl/certs/dhparam.pem 2048
You can host hexo sites on your server as well as with git,netlify,vercel & many more platforms.
So, this is how you can install & create a Hexo blog on Ubuntu 20.04.
