DrkPxl Labs Blog - Quick Reference Guide

This is a Hexo-based blog using the Cactus theme with a custom paper-dark color scheme.

Prerequisites

• Node.js (v22.11 as specified in netlify.toml)
• npm

Quick Start Commands

# Install dependencies
npm install

# Start local server with live reload
hexo server

# Create new draft post
hexo new draft "My Post Title"

# Create new page
hexo new page "page-name"

# Generate static files
hexo generate

# Clean generated files
hexo clean

Common Tasks

1. Local Development

# Start local server with drafts enabled
hexo server --draft

# Watch for changes
hexo server --watch

The site will be available at http://localhost:4000

2. Creating Content

# Create a draft post (goes to source/_drafts)
hexo new draft "My New Post"

# Create a page (goes to source/page-name/index.md)
hexo new page "page-name"

# Publish a draft
mv source/_drafts/post-name.md source/_posts/

Post Front Matter Template

---
title: Your Title
date: YYYY-MM-DD HH:mm:ss
tags: 
  - tag1
  - tag2
categories: 
  - category
description: Brief description of your post
preview: /path/to/preview/image (optional)
---

3. Updating Projects

Edit source/_data/projects.json to update the projects list. Format:

[
    {
       "name": "Project Name",
       "url": "project-url",
       "desc": "Project description"
    }
]

4. Deployment

# Clean and generate
hexo clean && hexo generate

# Deploy to Netlify
git add .
git commit -m "Your commit message"
git push

Netlify will automatically deploy when changes are pushed to the main branch.

Theme Customization

• Main theme config: themes/cactus/_config.yml
• Color scheme: themes/cactus/source/css/_colors/paperdark.styl
• Site config: _config.yml

Content Locations

source/
├── _posts/      # Published posts
├── _drafts/     # Draft posts
├── about/       # About page
├── images/      # Image assets
└── _data/       # Data files (projects.json)

Useful Tips

1. Use <!--more--> in posts to set excerpt break points
2. Images should be placed in source/images/
3. Draft posts won't show up in production but will show locally with --draft flag
4. YouTube videos can be embedded using: {% youtube video-id %}
5. The theme supports Font Awesome icons
6. Tags and categories are case-sensitive

Troubleshooting

If things aren't working:

1. Delete db.json
2. Run hexo clean
3. Delete node_modules and run npm install
4. Start fresh with hexo server

Remember to check Node.js version if there are unexpected errors.