<metaname="twitter:description"content="Just a place to make stuff">
<metaname="twitter:image"content="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/images/default.jpg"><linkrel="icon"href="/images/icon.png"><linkrel="alternate"href="/atom.xml"type="application/atom+xml"title="TheBestJohn"></head><bodyitemscopeitemtype="https://schema.org/WebPage"><navclass="menu"id="menu"><divclass="menu-inner"><divclass="menu__left-area"><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link menu__item__link--brand"href="/"title="Home"rel="home"><imgclass="menu__item__link--brand__image"src="/images/icon.png"alt="TheBestJohn"><spanclass="menu__item__link--brand__label">TheBestJohn</span></a></div></div><divclass="menu__right-area"><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/">Home</a></div><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/about">About</a></div><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/archives">Archives</a></div></div></div></nav><divclass="page-background"></div><divclass="content-container"><divclass="content-outer"><divclass="content-inner"itemscopeitemtype="https://schema.org/Blog"><sectionclass="post-list"><header><h2>Archives: 8/2012</h2></header><hr><articleclass="post-list__item"><divclass="post-list__item__col-1"><aclass="post-list__item__link"href="/posts/table-based-design/"><divclass="post-list__item__link__background"style="background-image:url('/images/default.jpg');"></div></a></div><divclass="post-list__item__col-2"><h3class="post-list__item__title"><ahref="/posts/table-based-design/"title="Table based design: Why I loathe it, and you should too!">Table based design: Why I loathe it, and you should too!</a></h3><divclass="post-list__item__meta"><aclass="post-list__item__meta__link"href="/categories/Web-Dev/">Web Dev</a></div><pclass="post-list__item__description">If there is one thing that grinds my gears it’s table based design and the “web development” companies that continue to use it.
<metaname="twitter:description"content="Just a place to make stuff">
<metaname="twitter:image"content="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/images/default.jpg"><linkrel="icon"href="/images/icon.png"><linkrel="alternate"href="/atom.xml"type="application/atom+xml"title="TheBestJohn"></head><bodyitemscopeitemtype="https://schema.org/WebPage"><navclass="menu"id="menu"><divclass="menu-inner"><divclass="menu__left-area"><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link menu__item__link--brand"href="/"title="Home"rel="home"><imgclass="menu__item__link--brand__image"src="/images/icon.png"alt="TheBestJohn"><spanclass="menu__item__link--brand__label">TheBestJohn</span></a></div></div><divclass="menu__right-area"><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/">Home</a></div><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/about">About</a></div><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/archives">Archives</a></div></div></div></nav><divclass="page-background"></div><divclass="content-container"><divclass="content-outer"><divclass="content-inner"itemscopeitemtype="https://schema.org/Blog"><sectionclass="post-list"><header><h2>Archives: 2012</h2></header><hr><articleclass="post-list__item"><divclass="post-list__item__col-1"><aclass="post-list__item__link"href="/posts/table-based-design/"><divclass="post-list__item__link__background"style="background-image:url('/images/default.jpg');"></div></a></div><divclass="post-list__item__col-2"><h3class="post-list__item__title"><ahref="/posts/table-based-design/"title="Table based design: Why I loathe it, and you should too!">Table based design: Why I loathe it, and you should too!</a></h3><divclass="post-list__item__meta"><aclass="post-list__item__meta__link"href="/categories/Web-Dev/">Web Dev</a></div><pclass="post-list__item__description">If there is one thing that grinds my gears it’s table based design and the “web development” companies that continue to use it.
<metaname="twitter:description"content="Just a place to make stuff">
<metaname="twitter:image"content="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/images/default.jpg"><linkrel="icon"href="/images/icon.png"><linkrel="alternate"href="/atom.xml"type="application/atom+xml"title="TheBestJohn"></head><bodyitemscopeitemtype="https://schema.org/WebPage"><navclass="menu"id="menu"><divclass="menu-inner"><divclass="menu__left-area"><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link menu__item__link--brand"href="/"title="Home"rel="home"><imgclass="menu__item__link--brand__image"src="/images/icon.png"alt="TheBestJohn"><spanclass="menu__item__link--brand__label">TheBestJohn</span></a></div></div><divclass="menu__right-area"><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/">Home</a></div><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/about">About</a></div><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/archives">Archives</a></div></div></div></nav><divclass="page-background"></div><divclass="content-container"><divclass="content-outer"><divclass="content-inner"itemscopeitemtype="https://schema.org/Blog"><sectionclass="post-list"><header><h2>Archives</h2></header><hr><articleclass="post-list__item"><divclass="post-list__item__col-1"><aclass="post-list__item__link"href="/posts/static-what-generator/"><divclass="post-list__item__link__background"style="background-image:url('/images/default.jpg');"></div></a></div><divclass="post-list__item__col-2"><h3class="post-list__item__title"><ahref="/posts/static-what-generator/"title="Static Site what?!">Static Site what?!</a></h3><divclass="post-list__item__meta"><aclass="post-list__item__meta__link"href="/categories/Web-Dev/">Web Dev</a></div><pclass="post-list__item__description">Recently I’ve become disillusioned with most CMS options. They’re a pain to keep updated, plugins are constantly being abandoned, and they’re so...</p></div></article><articleclass="post-list__item"><divclass="post-list__item__col-1"><aclass="post-list__item__link"href="/posts/table-based-design/"><divclass="post-list__item__link__background"style="background-image:url('/images/default.jpg');"></div></a></div><divclass="post-list__item__col-2"><h3class="post-list__item__title"><ahref="/posts/table-based-design/"title="Table based design: Why I loathe it, and you should too!">Table based design: Why I loathe it, and you should too!</a></h3><divclass="post-list__item__meta"><aclass="post-list__item__meta__link"href="/categories/Web-Dev/">Web Dev</a></div><pclass="post-list__item__description">If there is one thing that grinds my gears it’s table based design and the “web development” companies that continue to use it.
<metaname="twitter:image"content="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/images/default.jpg"><linkrel="icon"href="/images/icon.png"><linkrel="alternate"href="/atom.xml"type="application/atom+xml"title="TheBestJohn"></head><bodyitemscopeitemtype="https://schema.org/WebPage"><navclass="menu"id="menu"><divclass="menu-inner"><divclass="menu__left-area"><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link menu__item__link--brand"href="/"title="Home"rel="home"><imgclass="menu__item__link--brand__image"src="/images/icon.png"alt="TheBestJohn"><spanclass="menu__item__link--brand__label">TheBestJohn</span></a></div></div><divclass="menu__right-area"><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/">Home</a></div><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/about">About</a></div><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/archives">Archives</a></div></div></div></nav><divclass="page-background"></div><divclass="content-container"><divclass="content-outer"><divclass="content-inner"itemscopeitemtype="https://schema.org/Blog"><sectionclass="post-list"><header><h2>Archives</h2></header><hr><articleclass="post-list__item"><divclass="post-list__item__col-1"><aclass="post-list__item__link"href="/posts/static-what-generator/"><divclass="post-list__item__link__background"style="background-image:url('/images/default.jpg');"></div></a></div><divclass="post-list__item__col-2"><h3class="post-list__item__title"><ahref="/posts/static-what-generator/"title="Static what Generator?!">Static what Generator?!</a></h3><divclass="post-list__item__meta"><aclass="post-list__item__meta__link"href="/categories/Web-Dev/">Web Dev</a></div><pclass="post-list__item__description">Recently I’ve become disillusioned with most CMS options. They’re a pain to keep updated, plugins are constantly being abandoned, and they’re so...</p></div></article><articleclass="post-list__item"><divclass="post-list__item__col-1"><aclass="post-list__item__link"href="/posts/table-based-design/"><divclass="post-list__item__link__background"style="background-image:url('/images/default.jpg');"></div></a></div><divclass="post-list__item__col-2"><h3class="post-list__item__title"><ahref="/posts/table-based-design/"title="Table based design: Why I loathe it, and you should too!">Table based design: Why I loathe it, and you should too!</a></h3><divclass="post-list__item__meta"><aclass="post-list__item__meta__link"href="/categories/Web-Dev/">Web Dev</a></div><pclass="post-list__item__description">If there is one thing that grinds my gears it’s table based design and the “web development” companies that continue to use it.
<metaname="twitter:description"content="Just a place to make stuff">
<metaname="twitter:image"content="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/images/default.jpg"><linkrel="icon"href="/images/icon.png"><linkrel="alternate"href="/atom.xml"type="application/atom+xml"title="TheBestJohn"></head><bodyitemscopeitemtype="https://schema.org/WebPage"><navclass="menu"id="menu"><divclass="menu-inner"><divclass="menu__left-area"><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link menu__item__link--brand"href="/"title="Home"rel="home"><imgclass="menu__item__link--brand__image"src="/images/icon.png"alt="TheBestJohn"><spanclass="menu__item__link--brand__label">TheBestJohn</span></a></div></div><divclass="menu__right-area"><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/">Home</a></div><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/about">About</a></div><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/archives">Archives</a></div></div></div></nav><divclass="page-background"></div><divclass="content-container"><divclass="content-outer"><divclass="content-inner"itemscopeitemtype="https://schema.org/Blog"><sectionclass="post-list"><header><h2>Category: Web Dev</h2></header><hr><articleclass="post-list__item"><divclass="post-list__item__col-1"><aclass="post-list__item__link"href="/posts/static-what-generator/"><divclass="post-list__item__link__background"style="background-image:url('/images/default.jpg');"></div></a></div><divclass="post-list__item__col-2"><h3class="post-list__item__title"><ahref="/posts/static-what-generator/"title="Static Site what?!">Static Site what?!</a></h3><divclass="post-list__item__meta"><aclass="post-list__item__meta__link"href="/categories/Web-Dev/">Web Dev</a></div><pclass="post-list__item__description">Recently I’ve become disillusioned with most CMS options. They’re a pain to keep updated, plugins are constantly being abandoned, and they’re so...</p></div></article><articleclass="post-list__item"><divclass="post-list__item__col-1"><aclass="post-list__item__link"href="/posts/table-based-design/"><divclass="post-list__item__link__background"style="background-image:url('/images/default.jpg');"></div></a></div><divclass="post-list__item__col-2"><h3class="post-list__item__title"><ahref="/posts/table-based-design/"title="Table based design: Why I loathe it, and you should too!">Table based design: Why I loathe it, and you should too!</a></h3><divclass="post-list__item__meta"><aclass="post-list__item__meta__link"href="/categories/Web-Dev/">Web Dev</a></div><pclass="post-list__item__description">If there is one thing that grinds my gears it’s table based design and the “web development” companies that continue to use it.
<metaname="twitter:image"content="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/images/default.jpg"><linkrel="icon"href="/images/icon.png"><linkrel="alternate"href="/atom.xml"type="application/atom+xml"title="TheBestJohn"></head><bodyitemscopeitemtype="https://schema.org/WebPage"><navclass="menu"id="menu"><divclass="menu-inner"><divclass="menu__left-area"><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link menu__item__link--brand"href="/"title="Home"rel="home"><imgclass="menu__item__link--brand__image"src="/images/icon.png"alt="TheBestJohn"><spanclass="menu__item__link--brand__label">TheBestJohn</span></a></div></div><divclass="menu__right-area"><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/">Home</a></div><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/about">About</a></div><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/archives">Archives</a></div></div></div></nav><divclass="page-background"></div><divclass="content-container"><divclass="content-outer"><divclass="content-inner"itemscopeitemtype="https://schema.org/Blog"><sectionclass="post-list"><header><h2>Category: Web Dev</h2></header><hr><articleclass="post-list__item"><divclass="post-list__item__col-1"><aclass="post-list__item__link"href="/posts/static-what-generator/"><divclass="post-list__item__link__background"style="background-image:url('/images/default.jpg');"></div></a></div><divclass="post-list__item__col-2"><h3class="post-list__item__title"><ahref="/posts/static-what-generator/"title="Static what Generator?!">Static what Generator?!</a></h3><divclass="post-list__item__meta"><aclass="post-list__item__meta__link"href="/categories/Web-Dev/">Web Dev</a></div><pclass="post-list__item__description">Recently I’ve become disillusioned with most CMS options. They’re a pain to keep updated, plugins are constantly being abandoned, and they’re so...</p></div></article><articleclass="post-list__item"><divclass="post-list__item__col-1"><aclass="post-list__item__link"href="/posts/table-based-design/"><divclass="post-list__item__link__background"style="background-image:url('/images/default.jpg');"></div></a></div><divclass="post-list__item__col-2"><h3class="post-list__item__title"><ahref="/posts/table-based-design/"title="Table based design: Why I loathe it, and you should too!">Table based design: Why I loathe it, and you should too!</a></h3><divclass="post-list__item__meta"><aclass="post-list__item__meta__link"href="/categories/Web-Dev/">Web Dev</a></div><pclass="post-list__item__description">If there is one thing that grinds my gears it’s table based design and the “web development” companies that continue to use it.
<metaname="twitter:description"content="Just a place to make stuff">
<metaname="twitter:image"content="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/images/default.jpg"><linkrel="icon"href="/images/icon.png"><linkrel="alternate"href="/atom.xml"type="application/atom+xml"title="TheBestJohn"></head><bodyitemscopeitemtype="https://schema.org/WebPage"><navclass="menu"id="menu"><divclass="menu-inner"><divclass="menu__left-area"><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link menu__item__link--brand"href="/"title="Home"rel="home"><imgclass="menu__item__link--brand__image"src="/images/icon.png"alt="TheBestJohn"><spanclass="menu__item__link--brand__label">TheBestJohn</span></a></div></div><divclass="menu__right-area"><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/">Home</a></div><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/about">About</a></div><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/archives">Archives</a></div></div></div></nav><divclass="page-background"></div><divclass="content-container"><divclass="content-outer"><divclass="content-inner"itemscopeitemtype="https://schema.org/Blog"><sectionclass="post-list"><articleclass="post-list__item"><divclass="post-list__item__col-1"><aclass="post-list__item__link"href="/posts/static-what-generator/"><divclass="post-list__item__link__background"style="background-image:url('/images/default.jpg');"></div></a></div><divclass="post-list__item__col-2"><h3class="post-list__item__title"><ahref="/posts/static-what-generator/"title="Static Site what?!">Static Site what?!</a></h3><divclass="post-list__item__meta"><aclass="post-list__item__meta__link"href="/categories/Web-Dev/">Web Dev</a></div><pclass="post-list__item__description">Recently I’ve become disillusioned with most CMS options. They’re a pain to keep updated, plugins are constantly being abandoned, and they’re so...</p></div></article><articleclass="post-list__item"><divclass="post-list__item__col-1"><aclass="post-list__item__link"href="/posts/table-based-design/"><divclass="post-list__item__link__background"style="background-image:url('/images/default.jpg');"></div></a></div><divclass="post-list__item__col-2"><h3class="post-list__item__title"><ahref="/posts/table-based-design/"title="Table based design: Why I loathe it, and you should too!">Table based design: Why I loathe it, and you should too!</a></h3><divclass="post-list__item__meta"><aclass="post-list__item__meta__link"href="/categories/Web-Dev/">Web Dev</a></div><pclass="post-list__item__description">If there is one thing that grinds my gears it’s table based design and the “web development” companies that continue to use it.
<metaname="twitter:image"content="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/images/default.jpg"><linkrel="icon"href="/images/icon.png"><linkrel="alternate"href="/atom.xml"type="application/atom+xml"title="TheBestJohn"></head><bodyitemscopeitemtype="https://schema.org/WebPage"><navclass="menu"id="menu"><divclass="menu-inner"><divclass="menu__left-area"><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link menu__item__link--brand"href="/"title="Home"rel="home"><imgclass="menu__item__link--brand__image"src="/images/icon.png"alt="TheBestJohn"><spanclass="menu__item__link--brand__label">TheBestJohn</span></a></div></div><divclass="menu__right-area"><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/">Home</a></div><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/about">About</a></div><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/archives">Archives</a></div></div></div></nav><divclass="page-background"></div><divclass="content-container"><divclass="content-outer"><divclass="content-inner"itemscopeitemtype="https://schema.org/Blog"><sectionclass="post-list"><articleclass="post-list__item"><divclass="post-list__item__col-1"><aclass="post-list__item__link"href="/posts/static-what-generator/"><divclass="post-list__item__link__background"style="background-image:url('/images/default.jpg');"></div></a></div><divclass="post-list__item__col-2"><h3class="post-list__item__title"><ahref="/posts/static-what-generator/"title="Static what Generator?!">Static what Generator?!</a></h3><divclass="post-list__item__meta"><aclass="post-list__item__meta__link"href="/categories/Web-Dev/">Web Dev</a></div><pclass="post-list__item__description">Recently I’ve become disillusioned with most CMS options. They’re a pain to keep updated, plugins are constantly being abandoned, and they’re so...</p></div></article><articleclass="post-list__item"><divclass="post-list__item__col-1"><aclass="post-list__item__link"href="/posts/table-based-design/"><divclass="post-list__item__link__background"style="background-image:url('/images/default.jpg');"></div></a></div><divclass="post-list__item__col-2"><h3class="post-list__item__title"><ahref="/posts/table-based-design/"title="Table based design: Why I loathe it, and you should too!">Table based design: Why I loathe it, and you should too!</a></h3><divclass="post-list__item__meta"><aclass="post-list__item__meta__link"href="/categories/Web-Dev/">Web Dev</a></div><pclass="post-list__item__description">If there is one thing that grinds my gears it’s table based design and the “web development” companies that continue to use it.
<!DOCTYPE html><htmllang="en"><head><metacharset="UTF-8"><metahttp-equiv="X-UA-Compatible"content="IE=edge"><metaname="viewport"content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1"><title>Static Site what?! | TheBestJohn</title><linkrel="stylesheet"href="/libs/font-awesome/css/font-awesome.min.css"><linkrel="stylesheet"href="/css/index.css"><linkrel="stylesheet"href="/css/highlights/dracula.css"><linkrel="canonical"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/posts/static-what-generator/"/>
<!DOCTYPE html><htmllang="en"><head><metacharset="UTF-8"><metahttp-equiv="X-UA-Compatible"content="IE=edge"><metaname="viewport"content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1"><title>Static what Generator?! | TheBestJohn</title><linkrel="stylesheet"href="/libs/font-awesome/css/font-awesome.min.css"><linkrel="stylesheet"href="/css/index.css"><linkrel="stylesheet"href="/css/highlights/dracula.css"><linkrel="canonical"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/posts/static-what-generator/"/>
<metaname="description"content="Recently I’ve become disillusioned with most CMS options. They’re a pain to keep updated, plugins are constantly being abandoned, and…">
<metaproperty="og:type"content="article">
<metaproperty="og:title"content="Static Site what?!">
<metaproperty="og:title"content="Static what Generator?!">
<metaproperty="og:description"content="Recently I’ve become disillusioned with most CMS options. They’re a pain to keep updated, plugins are constantly being abandoned, and…">
<metaname="twitter:title"content="Static Site what?!">
<metaname="twitter:title"content="Static what Generator?!">
<metaname="twitter:description"content="Recently I’ve become disillusioned with most CMS options. They’re a pain to keep updated, plugins are constantly being abandoned, and…">
<metaname="twitter:image"content="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/images/default.jpg"><metaproperty="article:author"content="John Warren"><metaproperty="twitter:label1"content="Published at"><metaproperty="twitter:data1"content="April 27th 2018 17:40:00"><metaproperty="twitter:label2"content="Written by"><metaproperty="twitter:data2"content="John Warren"><linkrel="icon"href="/images/icon.png"><linkrel="alternate"href="/atom.xml"type="application/atom+xml"title="TheBestJohn"></head><bodyitemscopeitemtype="https://schema.org/WebPage"><navclass="menu"id="menu"><divclass="menu-inner"><divclass="menu__left-area"><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link menu__item__link--brand"href="/"title="Home"rel="home"><imgclass="menu__item__link--brand__image"src="/images/icon.png"alt="TheBestJohn"><spanclass="menu__item__link--brand__label">TheBestJohn</span></a></div></div><divclass="menu__right-area"><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/">Home</a></div><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/about">About</a></div><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/archives">Archives</a></div></div></div></nav><divclass="page-background"></div><divclass="content-container"><divclass="content-outer"><divclass="content-inner"itemscopeitemtype="https://schema.org/Blog"><articleclass="article"id="article"itemscopeitemtype="https://schema.org/BlogPosting"><h1class="article__title"itemprop="headline">Static Site what?!</h1><divclass="article__meta"><timeclass="article__meta__time"datetime="2018-04-27T21:40:00.000Z"itemprop="datePublished">April 27th 2018</time><divclass="article__meta__categories"><aclass="article__meta__categories__item"href="/categories/Web-Dev/">Web Dev</a></div></div><hr><divclass="article__contents"><p>Recently I’ve become disillusioned with most CMS options. They’re a pain to keep updated, plugins are constantly being abandoned, and they’re so prevalent in sites that they make a very attractive target for exploitation. In fact the first time I lost control of my server it was because of a bug in a themes use of timthumb.php. Basically, the attacker sent it an “image” file from a hosting website that had a php eval script hidden in it’s data. When accessed normally it showed an image but if they accessed the cached file that timthumb made, then the server treated it as a php file. From there they were able to install a remote shell, and own my server.</p>
<metaname="twitter:image"content="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/images/default.jpg"><metaproperty="article:author"content="John Warren"><metaproperty="twitter:label1"content="Published at"><metaproperty="twitter:data1"content="April 27th 2018 17:40:00"><metaproperty="twitter:label2"content="Written by"><metaproperty="twitter:data2"content="John Warren"><linkrel="icon"href="/images/icon.png"><linkrel="alternate"href="/atom.xml"type="application/atom+xml"title="TheBestJohn"></head><bodyitemscopeitemtype="https://schema.org/WebPage"><navclass="menu"id="menu"><divclass="menu-inner"><divclass="menu__left-area"><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link menu__item__link--brand"href="/"title="Home"rel="home"><imgclass="menu__item__link--brand__image"src="/images/icon.png"alt="TheBestJohn"><spanclass="menu__item__link--brand__label">TheBestJohn</span></a></div></div><divclass="menu__right-area"><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/">Home</a></div><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/about">About</a></div><divclass="menu__item"><aclass="menu__item__link"href="http://blog.thebestjohn.com/archives">Archives</a></div></div></div></nav><divclass="page-background"></div><divclass="content-container"><divclass="content-outer"><divclass="content-inner"itemscopeitemtype="https://schema.org/Blog"><articleclass="article"id="article"itemscopeitemtype="https://schema.org/BlogPosting"><h1class="article__title"itemprop="headline">Static what Generator?!</h1><divclass="article__meta"><timeclass="article__meta__time"datetime="2018-04-27T21:40:00.000Z"itemprop="datePublished">April 27th 2018</time><divclass="article__meta__categories"><aclass="article__meta__categories__item"href="/categories/Web-Dev/">Web Dev</a></div></div><hr><divclass="article__contents"><p>Recently I’ve become disillusioned with most CMS options. They’re a pain to keep updated, plugins are constantly being abandoned, and they’re so prevalent in sites that they make a very attractive target for exploitation. In fact the first time I lost control of my server it was because of a bug in a themes use of timthumb.php. Basically, the attacker sent it an “image” file from a hosting website that had a php eval script hidden in it’s data. When accessed normally it showed an image but if they accessed the cached file that timthumb made, then the server treated it as a php file. From there they were able to install a remote shell, and own my server.</p>
<h1id="Static-site-generators"><ahref="#Static-site-generators"class="headerlink"title="Static site generators"></a>Static site generators</h1><p>While the timthumb exploit was a pain in the ass, it was very interesting to me and made me seriously consider how I secure my systems. To that end I started reading into static site generators. Static site generators take your posts, usually formatted in some sort of markup, put them through a templating engine that outputs <code>.html</code> files, which you can then serve via the usual methods.</p>
<h3id="Why-tho"><ahref="#Why-tho"class="headerlink"title="Why tho?"></a>Why tho?</h3><p>The idea is that <em>most</em> sites don’t actually need to use dynamic code. Their content is, for the most, part static. Users aren’t interacting with the content (other than the comments sections and forms but we’ll talk about that later). They are, instead, just reading it. The only person who seems to be interacting with it is the person that owns the site. Even then, the owner isn’t actively interacting. They are writing a post, or updating a page. After that, everything stays the same.</p>
<p>All this is a “face-value” reason to move over to a static site. I have an even deeper reason for wanting to use a static site, portability. Static sites allow you to use a generic format for your posts. I write all my posts in markdown, a very common and widely used format. With this I can move from generator to generator without much change. If I were to make my blog in something like Wordpress, my post information would be locked into a <em>very</em> specific database format. If I, for some reason or another, decided I no longer wanted to use Wordpress it would be a lot of work modifying all my posts to be compatible with the new platform.</p>
<h1id="Options"><ahref="#Options"class="headerlink"title="Options"></a>Options</h1><p>When it comes to static site generators, there are a plethora of options.</p>
<h1id="Options"><ahref="#Options"class="headerlink"title="Options"></a>Options</h1><p>When it comes to static site generators, there are a plethora of options. The idea is to make sure you know what you’re signing up for. They come in many languages and each come with theor own pros and cons. Choose something that’s written in a language you’re somewhat comfortable with and something that meets your criteria. For me, I wanted:</p>
<ul>
<li>Something with configurable routes (mysite.com/post/post-name/ could easily be mysite.com/articles/post-name/)</li>
<li>Was reasonably markdown agnostic (I didn’t want too many special tags in my markdown in case I wanted/needed to switch generators)</li>
<li>Had a nice theming engine with some good themes already made (I can make one but wanted to get up and runnig quickly)</li>
</ul>
<h1id="Enter-Hexo"><ahref="#Enter-Hexo"class="headerlink"title="Enter, Hexo"></a>Enter, <ahref="https://hexo.io/"target="_blank"rel="noopener">Hexo</a></h1><p>Hexo is a neat little package. </p>
<p>Originally I thought I would install it, set up an apache virtual reverse proxy via an <code>.htaccess</code> file and let node serve static files. Some people do this. It’s a valid way to serve a site. The problem that I have with this, is that it’s just another vulnerable layer of code that I don’t have the inclination to audit. It could potentially have glaring security holes and I wouldn’t know. Again, I want to clarify that I don’t know much of anything about security. I’m not a cryptographer, nor an expert on cyber security. However, I can easily read the html that comes out the other end of the site generator and verify that there are no well-known issues with the javascript or html.</p>
<p>If this is the way you wanted to do it, you would need, at the very least, this sort of <code>.htaccess</code> configuration in your root<br><figureclass="highlight plain"><table><tr><tdclass="gutter"><pre><spanclass="line">1</span><br><spanclass="line">2</span><br><spanclass="line">3</span><br><spanclass="line">4</span><br><spanclass="line">5</span><br><spanclass="line">6</span><br></pre></td><tdclass="code"><pre><spanclass="line">RewriteEngine On</span><br><spanclass="line">DirectoryIndex index.html </span><br><spanclass="line">RewriteRule ^$ http://127.0.0.1:4000 [P,L]</span><br><spanclass="line">RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f</span><br><spanclass="line">RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d</span><br><spanclass="line">RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://127.0.0.1:4000/$1 [P,L]</span><br></pre></td></tr></table></figure></p>
})();</script><noscript>Enable JavaScript to see comments.</noscript><!-- Meta Tags for Structured Data--><metaitemprop="dateModified"content="2018-04-30T15:07:13.459Z"><metaitemprop="articleBody"content="If there is one thing that grinds my gears it’s table based design and the “web development” companies that continue to use it.
