
Show HN: HexoPress – a blog that syncs with your Google Docs - lewisjoe
http://hexopress.com
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MrQuincle
I think you've something bigger here than you realize. :-) If you would
indeed:

1) introduce some opportunity for others to write stylesheets;

2) support custom domains,

then I would expect something like this to really take off.

I see many advantages: Not all kind of Wordpress plugins that have to be
checked or maintained. Not explaining what can be adjusted, what not. Having a
very simple user interface for people (Google docs) that just works. I foresee
also some disadvantages, especially about customization: from SEO, to footers,
contact page, etc.

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lewisjoe
Thank you! Regarding customizations, things like SEO, custom footers & pages
are in fact very much possible. It's just that I didn't want to put in a lot
of effort, with my itch being the only validation :)

I'll keep working on it, focussing on customization options :)

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vhn
The name is similar to the Hexo blog platform what may cause some confusion.
[1]

[1] [https://hexo.io/](https://hexo.io/)

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lewisjoe
Didn't see that coming!

I was about to buy a domain named - [http://hexo.press](http://hexo.press),
which would have been a bigger bummer.

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iamdave
Hrm. You have my attention. Is there a demo blog up somewhere I could look at
and does this support custom blog themes and post templating yet?

~~~
krptos
Thanks! Here's mine - [http://hexopress.com/@joe](http://hexopress.com/@joe).

Nope, I haven't started concentrating on making it all that customizable,
except for a few basics. It's in the roadmap.

~~~
webwanderings
Wordpress also recently came up with the add-on to have your Google Docs saved
up as blog posts. I see parallel here.

Interesting idea.

~~~
lewisjoe
Yes. Comparatively speaking, there's this tiny little difference in
perspective.

HexoPress offers a complete sync between a folder on your Google Drive and
your blog. Wordpress doesn't. It just takes a given post from Google Docs,
when you are done with it and puts it into its database. That's pretty much
it.

~~~
webwanderings
Makes sense.

I'm not sure why I would use "your service" to do this (blog on my Google,
only to have the document show up somewhere else). I see value in a service if
such connector is available within Google for me to keep it within Google.
Nothing wrong with your service, and it is a fantastic idea, but just saying.
I think this idea is more feasible if it is available as an independent
entity. I find it strange that neither Microsoft, nor Google cared to think
about it, given that a word processor is a natural fit.

~~~
lewisjoe
Good perspective. Wordpress is excellent at what it does. It makes complete
sense, to go for it to do some serious blogging.

This project is for the rest of us, lazy bloggers who've gotten used to using
Google Docs as a personal scratchpad and would want to blog right from there!

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nbcesar
Great idea - if I could change the style and some additional customizations, I
would probably pay a couple bucks a month. Actually looking to start up a blog
soon and starting to look around at the options.

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unfocused
Very neat idea. Btw, don't forget to add .DS_Store to your .gitignore file.

~~~
lewisjoe
Oops! Thanks. Will add it.

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ksvarma
This is great. I just published my first post. Its been about 15 minutes. So
far haven't seen it coming through. Is there a process that kicks every
sometime?

~~~
jmpz
It looks like you have to click the refresh button to get it to display.

~~~
ksvarma
Yes, that worked! Thanks.

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philamonster
Any support for inserted images in docs? Just seeing placeholders currently
with image dimensions.

~~~
lewisjoe
Done. HexoPress now supports images from your Google Doc! Go ahead. Login &
refresh the blog - [http://hexopress.com/login](http://hexopress.com/login)

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shakkeel
So where will my blogs be published?

~~~
lewisjoe
Once you sign up, you'll have your blog served at
hexopress.com/@<the_username_you_choose>

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asaddhamani
Any plans on allowing subdomains so people can use their own domains? Wouldn't
mind a hexopress footer (similar to how PostHaven would do it) on the site in
exchange.

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lewisjoe
Yes, certainly. I'm short of prior experience generating dynamic subdomains.
That's probably why I didn't put it in the first cut.

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relaxitup
Yeah, if you could support custom domains, I'd definitely use this. Also,
looks like we could self-host from your github code? By the way, you've come
up with quite a brilliant, simple, and efficient idea.

~~~
lewisjoe
I'll figure how to get that done!

The README there, isn't complete. I'll pack the README with more details on
getting it to work on dev/prod machines. Hopefully, by evening :)

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jclos
It looks quite cool. How do you plan to monetize it into surviving?

~~~
lewisjoe
Thanks! Regarding monetizing it, I have no plans yet. On doing the math, looks
like it can take up to a 1000 users, before it costs me anything significant.

If at all it goes north of thousand users(which is a really long way!), I'd
give it a thought :)

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jmpz
This is great! Is there any way to update the stylesheet?

~~~
lewisjoe
Glad that you liked it. Updating stylesheet is not possible as of now. But,
I'll be working on making a lot of it customizable, going forward :)

