And welcome to this bonus edition of our weekly Dev Diary
Let’s talk about blogging… Over the past year or so, we’ve explored and experimented with lots of ideas for a simple blogging solution. Our goal has always been to create something that just works—no databases, no setup, and no need for third-party services.
After introducing the new File feature a few weeks ago, something clicked: this could be the foundation for a lightweight markdown-based blogging setup, built right into the app…
What we’re sharing today is an early proof of concept. We don’t usually show components this raw, but we think it’s important to get your thoughts and feedback as early as possible.
@ben will walk you through how it all works in the video below
The whole team is looking forward to hearing your thoughts on this Blogging Preview in Elements
What I didn’t see was the ability to embed images or videos within the markdown. Also, it wasn’t clear how you’ll support RRS with this feature.
I’ve mentioned Dave Winer and his Wordland initiative before (http://scripting.com/). It would be really nice to tie into that if at all possible (even if one-way), as it opens up the ability to post once and publish across multiple platforms (e.g. BlueSky posts mimicking your blog posts).
That said, congrats: not only does this look like a very useful and usable blog solution, as you note in your short video it also appears to open up something else I was struggling with your approach on (articles). But again, embedding images and videos come into play. With this Markdown/File solution, it would be easy enough for me to create a program (or even an Apple Shortcut) that feeds it.
Markdown supports embedding, in a similar way that the editor on this very forum does. You do need to have those images and videos stored somewhere though.
I personally would love to see functionality added so that one can blog without using Elements - so an online editor. This opens up blogging from a smartphone for starters, and is a gateway to a full CMS.
The first thing which comes to mind is the ability to create posts via a browser. As much as Elements is great, I would hate to open it every time I wanted a simple blog post. The ability to post from a phone etc would be minimum requirement (imho).
Also as Thom says, an image, images or a gallery would seem essential.
Having said that, it looks very nice for a very early preview and thanks for showing it.
Ben asked about missing features. I want to emphasize that I understand this is very, very early. It looks like a simple and fast way to get started with a basic blog—which just so happens to be exactly what I need.
Here are a few features I’d find valuable:
Related articles
Next/previous post navigation within the currently viewed category
Ideally, with a way to organize these so I can guide readers to the most logical next article
Inline links
Support for images/photos with captions and options for on-page alignment and positioning
Category and tag landing pages with a description area
Full meta/OG data—customizable per post, category/tag landing page, and the homepage
For me, less is more—but I still need the ability to lead the reader and provide what search engine spiders are looking for.
Hi Everyone,
Thanks for sharing the blogging proof of concept in Dev Diary Ep75—very excited about the direction you’re taking with markdown-based posts and simplicity at the core.
I’d like to suggest a feature that could really elevate this:
A browser-based interface to manage blog content, accessible via login/password, right from the published site.
A “Login” button appears (or they visit a hidden /admin route).
After logging in securely, they can:
Write and publish new markdown posts
Edit or delete existing posts
Upload images/media for use in posts
Preview before publishing
All changes saved directly to the hosted site—no need to open RapidWeaver or Elements
Why this matters:
While Elements is fantastic for design and development, it’s not practical to ask clients to use the full app just to create a simple blog post. A lightweight, browser-based interface would make it easy to hand off a finished site while still allowing clients to manage content on their own.
Even a basic implementation on top of the File feature would be a huge step toward a true flat-file CMS experience.
Would love to hear what others think or if something like this is already being explored.
Thanks again,
Mark
Very nice work!
It would be very handy, if the post’s could be created from everywhere. That means, ist should be usable without a login in elements itself.
This requires of course that you create a format at the beginning, into which you then only have to ‘fill’ the text and images, as well as the desired information.
I am with Erwin on that one. I t will be great to see an online editor so that one can access the blog online.
But this is a great start and very promising. Thanks team realmac!
I’m already using the now discontinued Alloy to do all of that. A shame 3rd party developers are no longer able to continue make a living supporting RW/Elements.
the reason for this is that elements is a completely new framework. the request for a simple blogging system was quite high in the community …
there are already a lot of new and many “old” 3rd party developers who are working on new tools and templates for elements or a blogging tool like Alloy.
many third-party developers have already recognized the potential of rw-elements, and as soon as rw-elements is officially launched, i am sure the marketplace will be filled with great third-party applications. these 3rd party developers will then certainly be able to do good business and make a living from it.
yes, it is sad that some “old” third-party developers have left the Rapidweaver- Cosmos, but it was their decision.
This is absolutely the way to go. I use Foundry 1, 2 and 3, Foundation 1 and 6 as well as Source. This is not sustainable because they are very different and I get confused when not been working for a while in one of those. Not to mention all the stacks I bought. Not saying they are bad.
ONE framework to master fully and then third party components . I like the consistency in Elements. I’m sure there will be lots of amazing third party components and templates.
This is looking really good. I like the fact that it uses the standard front matter as that will make it extremely easy to carry forward a lot of my archival posts as they all use this format.
Based on what I could tell this system would allow me to create my posts in an external editor and then by simply placing the file in the correct folder it would be picked up by the system. So I would not necessarily be forced to create the post in Elements, is that correct?
I’m also assuming if I have a bunch of images on my server I can link to them in the markdown and I’ll get images embedded in my post. Which once again ties in well with what I currently use as this is how my posts are setup.
This is super exciting and I can’t wait to get my hands on this new system.
I too think that this is not a way for clients to edit or create blog posts. Unless there’s a way to have clients somehow login to create and edit posts and change maybe defined content areas, it’s useless for client work.
It’s a nice start though and I’m curious how it’s going to develop further.
Just when I was beginning to have my doubts about Elements, I find out you’re adding a blogging component to the mix, and I couldn’t be happier. Of course, the degree to which I’m happy depends in large measure on how full-featured the blog component is. I realize this is only a minimalist effort that’s here to satisfy the slightly more than minimalist people like me. That’s fine. As long as I have something with which I can publish the occasional blog post about my art and photography (or whatever shiny object that catches my eye) my needs are satisfied. Thanks, Elements Team!
Thanks for sharing.
A browser-based interface to manage blog content, accessible via login/password, right from the published site.
I realize this is only a minimalist effort that’s here to satisfy the slightly more than minimalist people like me. That’s fine. As long as I have something with which I can publish the occasional blog post about my art and photography (or whatever shiny object that catches my eye) my needs are satisfied. Thanks, Elements Team!