Hexo Installation and Usage

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My server was about to expire recently, so I decided to migrate VRC Blog to GitHub. I started looking for a good theme. I originally wanted to use the Typecho theme I’m currently using (which was ported from Jekyll), but I couldn’t find it when I searched for it half a year ago. Lately, I’ve been wanting to check out Hexo. After searching for themes, I remembered that Argon, which I really like, has a Hexo version. Hence, this article.

Environment

Requires Node.js 10.13 or higher (12.0+ recommended).

Requires Git.

Installation

Run the command:

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npm install -g hexo-cli

Check if the installation was successful:

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hexo -h

Create a New Blog

Navigate to the folder where you want to install:

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hexo init <folder_name>

Enter the folder:

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cd <folder_name>

Install dependencies:

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npm i

After creation, you can modify ./_config.yml for configuration.

Install a Theme

Pick a theme from the Theme Store . Installation methods may vary by theme, so refer to the specific theme documentation.

The following steps are for the Argon theme:

Clone the Theme

First, clone the theme repository into the ./themes folder:

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git clone https://github.com/solstice23/hexo-theme-argon.git

Rename the cloned folder to argon.

Install the ejs renderer:

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npm install hexo-renderer-ejs

In the ./_config.yml file, set the theme to argon.

Configuration File

Modify ./themes/argon/_config.yml to change settings.

Configure Search

Run this in the root directory:

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npm install hexo-generator-search --save

Then add the following options to ./_config.yml:

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search:
  path: search.xml
  field: post
  content: true

Writing

Create a new post:

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hexo new [layout] <title>

[layout] is an optional attribute:

Layout	Description	Path
post	Post (default)	source/_posts
page	Page	source
draft	Draft	source/_drafts

Once created, you can start writing your article.

Preview:

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hexo s

Visit localhost:4000 to view.

Generating Static Files

Run the command:

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hexo generate

Running this command only generates files that don’t exist yet. It’s usually better to clean the previous build before generating.

References

https://hexo.io/docs/

https://github.com/solstice23/hexo-theme-argon