---
author: ''
category: ''
date: 2013/03/01 12:49:41
description: ''
link: ''
priority: ''
slug: creating-a-site-not-a-blog-with-nikola
tags: nikola, python
title: Creating a Site (Not a Blog) with Nikola
type: text
updated: 2013/03/01 12:49:41
url_type: ''
---
One of the most frequent questions I get about `Nikola <http://nikola.ralsina.me>`_
is "but how do I create a site that's not a blog?". And of course, that's because the
documentation is heavily blog-oriented. This document will change that ;-)

Since it started, Nikola has had the capabilities to create generic sites. For example,
Nikola's `own site <http://nikola.ralsina.me>`_ is a fairly generic one. Let's go
step by step on how you can do something like that.

.. sidebar:: Using 5.3?

   This tutorial is based on Nikola from github master. Some details are not correct
   for the 5.3 release. Master works quite well most of the time, but you may want to
   wait until the 5.4 release in a few days (which will include an updated version of
   this document).

As usual when starting a nikola site, you start with ``nikola init`` which creates a
empty semi-configured site::

    $ nikola init mysite
    Created empty site at mysite.

Then we go into the new ``mysite`` folder, and make the needed changes in the ``conf.py``
configuration file:

.. code-block:: python


    ##############################################
    # Configuration, please edit
    ##############################################


    # Data about this site
    BLOG_AUTHOR = "Roberto Alsina"
    BLOG_TITLE = "Not a Blog"
    # This is the main URL for your site. It will be used
    # in a prominent link
    SITE_URL = "http://notablog.ralsina.me"
    BLOG_EMAIL = "ralsina@kde.org"
    BLOG_DESCRIPTION = "This is a demo site (not a blog) for Nikola."

    #
    # Some things in the middle you don't really need to change...
    #

    post_pages = (
        ("pages/*.txt", "", "story.tmpl", False),
    )

And now we are ready to create our first page::

    $ nikola new_post -p
    Creating New Post
    -----------------

    Enter title: index
    Your post's text is at:  pages/index.txt

.. note:: The ``-p`` option in the ``nikola new_post`` command means we are creating a page and not a blog post.

We can now build and preview our site::

    $ nikola build
    Scanning posts.done!
    .  render_site:output/categories/index.html
    .  render_sources:output/index.txt
    .  render_rss:output/rss.xml
    :
    :
    : [Much more of the same]

    $ nikola serve
    Serving HTTP on 127.0.0.1 port 8000 ...

And you can see your (very empty) site in http://localhost:8000

So, what's in that ``pages/index.txt`` file?

.. code-block:: rest

    .. title: index
    .. slug: index
    .. date: 2013/03/01 10:26:17
    .. tags:
    .. link:
    .. description:


    Write your post here.

Title is the page title, slug is the name of the generated HTML file
(in this case it would be ``index.html``) the date doesn't matter much in
not-blogs, same for tags and link. Description is useful for SEO purposes
if you care for that.

And below, the content. By default you are expected to use
`reStructured text <http://nikola.ralsina.me/quickstart.html>`_ but
Nikola supports a ton of formats, including Markdown, plain HTML, BBCode,
Wiki, and Textile.

So, let's give the page a nicer title, and some fake content. Since the default
Nikola theme (called "site") is based on `bootstrap <http://twitter.github.com/bootstrap/>`_
you can use anything you like from it:

.. code-block:: rest

    .. title: Welcome To The Fake Site
    .. slug: index
    .. date: 2013/03/01 10:26:17
    .. tags:
    .. link:
    .. description: Fake Site version 1, welcome page!


    .. class:: hero-unit span6

    .. admonition:: This is a Fake Site

        It pretends to be about things, but is really just an example.
        So, don't click this button, it leads nowhere.

        .. class:: btn

        Click Me!


    .. class:: span5

    Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Mauris non nunc turpis.
    Phasellus a ullamcorper leo. Sed fringilla dapibus orci eu ornare. Quisque
    gravida quam a mi dignissim consequat. Morbi sed iaculis mi. Vivamus ultrices
    mattis euismod. Mauris aliquet magna eget mauris volutpat a egestas leo rhoncus.
    In hac habitasse platea dictumst. Ut sed mi arcu. Nullam id massa eu orci
    convallis accumsan. Nunc faucibus sodales justo ac ornare. In eu congue eros.
    Pellentesque iaculis risus urna. Proin est lorem, scelerisque non elementum at,
    semper vel velit. Phasellus consectetur orci vel tortor tempus imperdiet. Class
    aptent taciti sociosqu ad litora torquent per conubia nostra, per inceptos
    himenaeos.

    [And more in the same vein]

.. admonition:: TIP: Nice URLs

   If you like your URLs without the ".html" then you want to create folders and
   put the pages in ``index.html`` inside them. Example::

       nikola new_post -p pages/foo/index.txt

   which will create a page you could access as "http://yoursite.com/foo"

And that's it. You will want to change the SIDEBAR_LINKS option to create a reasonable
"menu" for your site, you will want to hack the theme (check ``nikola help bootswatch_theme``
for a quick & dirty solution), and you may want to add a blog later on, for company news
or whatever.

.. admonition:: TIP: So, how do I add a blog now?

    First, change the ``post_pages`` option like this:

    .. code-block:: python

        post_pages = (
            ("pages/*.txt", "", "story.tmpl", False),
            ("posts/*.txt", "blog", "post.tmpl", True),
        )

    And to avoid a conflict (because blogs try to generate ``/index.html``:

    .. code-block:: python

        INDEX_PATH = "blog"

    Create a post with ``nikola new_post`` and that's it, you now have a blog
    in http://yoursite.com/blog (you may want to add links to it in SIDEBAR_LINKS of course).

You can see the finished site in http://notablog.ralsina.me and its full configuration in
//ralsina.me/listings/notablog/conf.py.html

I hope this was helpful!