Ghost to Middleman

GhostBuster can export content that can be used in a Middleman project to build a static website.

Publishing a Ghost site using Middleman is a three-step process. First, prepare a Middleman project, then use Ghostbuster to provide content and, finally, use Middleman to publish it.

GhostBuster’s Middleman filter generates content to be placed in the source directory of a Middleman project. It produces pages from the Ghost server’s content. A complete Middleman project will also require a site layout, which Middleman can produce using templates.

Use of Middleman is beyond the scope of this article but instructions are available on its website.

! This filter should be considered experimental.

Prepare

Install Middleman

! Full instructions are available on the Middleman website.

Middleman requires a Ruby environment. Install the Middleman gem:

$ gem install middleman

You can check the installed version:

$ middleman version
Middleman 3.3.2      </small>

Install Templates

Middleman uses templates to create sites. There is a casper-like theme available:

git clone https://github.com/danielbayerlein/middleman-casper ~/.middleman/casper

Create Project

Create a new project using a template of your choosing.

$ middleman init mysite --template=casper
$ cd mysite

Install any gem dependencies that the template has

$ bundle install

Test that it works

$ middleman server

Point a browser at the address given when the server starts, usually http://localhost:4567. Stop the server with Control+C when satisfied.

Export content

! The tasks in this section need to be completed on the Ghost server host.

Create a suitable GhostBuster environment file, for example:

Middleman:
 ghost_environment: development
 destination: ssh:myuser@myhost/home/myuser/static-sites/mysite/source
 filter: middleman
 published: true

This example uses SSH to export to another host, which assumes a suitable key is lodged with an accesible SSH agent, as described here.
the export destination is the middleman project’s source directory.

</small>

Run GhostBuster to export the content. Assuming a suitable environment similar to the above example is in middleman.yml:

ghostbuster -v -f middleman.yml

Publish

To publish the site, Middleman uses the files in the source directory to build static HTML pages in the build directory.

To preview the site before building it, go to the project’s directory and start the Middleman server:

cd ~/static-sites/mysite
middleman server

Point a browser at the address given when the server starts; this is usually http://localhost:4567. Check it looks good then stop the server and build the static site pages:

middleman build

The contents of the build directory can then be loaded onto any static web server. You can run up a simple server from the build directory (cd build) to try the static site. Either with Python:

$ python -m SimpleHTTPServer

or Ruby

$ ruby -run -e httpd . -p 8000

Both of these examples serve the content at http://localhost:8000.