MultiMarkdown

The content of this site is written using the MultiMarkdown syntax, and then converted to XHTML. I also use SmartyPants to simplify making the content “typographically correct.”

Hosting

Hosted by NearlyFreeSpeech.NET. They offer a unique pricing plan based purely on the actual storage space and bandwidth used, with no monthly fees.

However, I also make use of Amazon’s S3 service for hosting larger files. The bandwidth and storage costs are much lower, but the performance is supposedly not quite good enough to act as your sole web server (though that is actually possible for static pages…) Basically, my web site (which has both static and dynamic pages) will be hosted with NFSN, while images and files for download will be hosted at S3.

This does mean that my bandwidth and storage is no longer free (or more precisely, paid for), but the added flexibility should be worth it. (Donations to keep things running are certainly welcome!)

Apache

NearlyFreeSpeech.NET uses Apache as their server software. Since there is still some Oddmuse content, I continue to use a custom .htaccess file to allow Oddmuse to serve any non-existent pages:

RewriteEngine on

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ /index.cgi/$1 [L,QSA]

As content is migrated from Oddmuse to Movable Type, I am using permanent redirects in the .htaccess file to forward old URL’s to their new locations.

Email

Email is provided by Google Apps. Check out [[Using Gmail and Postfix]] for more information on how to use Google’s email services.

Typography

I’ve tried to apply some principles of well thought out typography to this site, using the following references:

• Five simple steps to better typography

• Web Typography Sucks

It really does make a difference!

CSS

The CSS for this site is broken into separate files in order to better differentiate the different components. One file applies the typography techniques mentioned above; one applies colors; one applies the decorations and branding; one manages the overall page layout; one applies code to base the appearance of tables on that produced by the booktabs package for LaTeX. A separate file holds a few tweaks specific to Movable Type.

Of course, this is all moot if you are using IE to view this site. In that case, I take no responsibility for the way things look on your screen. Treat yourself: use a real browser….

Legal Info

The content of this web site, unless otherwise specified, is licensed under a Creative Commons License by Fletcher T. Penney.

Most of my software is released under the GNU General Public License. See the individual files for more information.