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New features in v1

Authors
Series: Blog Starter
Episodes: (2/4)

Overview

A post on the new features introduced in v1.0. New features:

First load JS decreased from 43kB to 39kB despite all the new features added! 1

See upgrade guide below if you are migrating from v0 version of the template.

Theme colors

You can easily modify the theme color by changing the primary attribute in the tailwind config file:

tailwind.config.js
theme: {
    colors: {
      primary: colors.teal,
      gray: colors.neutral,
      ...
    }
  ...
}

The primary color attribute should be assigned an object with keys from 50, 100, 200 ... 900 and the corresponding color code values.

Tailwind includes great default color palettes that can be used for theming your own website. Check out customizing colors documentation page for the full range of options.

Migrating from v1? You can revert to the previous theme by setting primary to colors.sky (Tailwind 2.2.2 and above, otherwise colors.lightBlue) and changing gray to colors.gray.

From v1.1.2+, you can also customize the style of your code blocks easily by modifying the css/prism.css stylesheet. Token classnames are compatible with prismjs so you can copy and adapt token styles from a prismjs stylesheet e.g. prism themes.

Xdm MDX compiler

We switched the MDX bundler from next-mdx-remote to mdx-bundler. This uses xdm under the hood, the latest micromark 3 and remark, rehype libraries.

Warning: If you were using custom remark or rehype libraries, please upgrade to micromark 3 compatible ones. If you are upgrading, please delete node_modules and package-lock.json to avoid having past dependencies related issues.

xdm contains multiple improvements over @mdx-js/mdx, the compiler used internally by next-mdx-remote, but there might be some breaking behaviour changes. Please check your markdown output to verify.

Some new possibilities include loading components directly in the mdx file using the import syntax and including js code which could be compiled and bundled at the build step.

For example, the following jsx snippet can be used directly in an MDX file to render the page title component:

// Or import PageTitle from './components/PageTitle.js' if you are using js
import PageTitle from './components/PageTitle.tsx'
;<PageTitle> Using JSX components in MDX </PageTitle>

The default configuration resolves all components relative to the components directory.

Note: Components which require external image loaders also require additional esbuild configuration. Components which are dependent on global application state on lifecycle like the Nextjs Link component would also not work with this setup as each mdx file is built independently. For such cases, it is better to use component substitution.

Table of contents component

Inspired by Docusaurus and Gatsby's gatsby-remark-table-of-contents, the toc variable containing all the top level headings of the document is passed to the MDX file and can be styled accordingly. To make generating a table of contents (TOC) simple, you can use the existing TOCInline component.

For example, the TOC in this post was generated with the following code:

<TOCInline toc={props.toc} exclude="Overview" toHeading={2} />

You can customise the headings that are displayed by configuring the fromHeading and toHeading props, or exclude particular headings by passing a string or a string array to the exclude prop. By default, all headings that are of depth 3 or smaller are indented. This can be configured by changing the indentDepth property. A asDisclosure prop can be used to render the TOC within an expandable disclosure element.

Here's the full TOC rendered in a disclosure element.

<TOCInline toc={props.toc} asDisclosure />
Table of Contents

Layouts

You can map mdx blog content to layout components by configuring the frontmatter field. For example, this post is written with the new PostSimple layout!

Adding new templates

layout templates are stored in the ./layouts folder. You can add your React components that you want to map to markdown content in this folder. The component file name must match that specified in the markdown frontmatter layout field.

The only required field is children which contains the rendered MDX content, though you would probably want to pass in the frontMatter contents and render it in the template.

You can configure the template to take in other fields - see PostLayout component for an example.

Here's an example layout which you can further customise:

export default function ExampleLayout({ frontMatter, children }) {
  const { date, title } = frontMatter

  return (
    <SectionContainer>
      <div>{date}</div>
      <h1>{title}</h1>
      <div>{children}</div>
    </SectionContainer>
  )
}

Configuring a blog post frontmatter

Use the layout frontmatter field to specify the template you want to map the markdown post to. Here's how the frontmatter of this post looks like:

---
title: 'New features in v1'
date: '2021-05-26   '
tags: ['next-js', 'tailwind', 'guide']
draft: false
summary: 'Introducing the new layout features - you can map mdx blog content to layout components by configuring the frontmatter field'
layout: PostSimple
---

You can configure the default layout in the respective page section by modifying the DEFAULT_LAYOUT variable. The DEFAULT_LAYOUT for blog posts page is set to PostLayout.

Extend

layout is mapped to wrapper which wraps the entire MDX content.

export const MDXComponents = {
  Image,
  a: CustomLink,
  pre: Pre,
  wrapper: ({ components, layout, ...rest }) => {
    const Layout = require(`../layouts/${layout}`).default
    return <Layout {...rest} />
  },
}

export const MDXLayoutRenderer = ({ layout, mdxSource, ...rest }) => {
  const MDXLayout = useMemo(() => getMDXComponent(mdxSource), [mdxSource])

  return <MDXLayout layout={layout} components={MDXComponents} {...rest} />
}

Use the MDXLayoutRenderer component on a page where you want to accept a layout name to map to the desired layout. You need to pass the layout name from the layout folder (it has to be an exact match).

Analytics

The template now supports plausible, simple analytics and google analytics. Configure siteMetadata.js with the settings that correspond with the desired analytics provider.

analytics: {
    // supports plausible, simpleAnalytics or googleAnalytics
    plausibleDataDomain: '', // e.g. tailwind-nextjs-starter-blog.vercel.app
    simpleAnalytics: false, // true or false
    googleAnalyticsId: '', // e.g. UA-000000-2 or G-XXXXXXX
  },

Custom events are also supported. You can import the logEvent function from @components/analytics/[ANALYTICS-PROVIDER] file and call it when triggering certain events of interest. Note: Additional configuration might be required depending on the analytics provider, please check their official documentation for more information.

Blog comments system

We have also added support for giscus, utterances or disqus. To enable, simply configure siteMetadata.js comments property with the desired provider and settings as specified in the config file.

comment: {
    // Select a provider and use the environment variables associated to it
    // https://vercel.com/docs/environment-variables
    provider: 'giscus', // supported providers: giscus, utterances, disqus
    giscusConfig: {
      // Visit the link below, and follow the steps in the 'configuration' section
      // https://giscus.app/
      repo: process.env.NEXT_PUBLIC_GISCUS_REPO,
      repositoryId: process.env.NEXT_PUBLIC_GISCUS_REPOSITORY_ID,
      category: process.env.NEXT_PUBLIC_GISCUS_CATEGORY,
      categoryId: process.env.NEXT_PUBLIC_GISCUS_CATEGORY_ID,
      mapping: 'pathname', // supported options: pathname, url, title
      reactions: '1', // Emoji reactions: 1 = enable / 0 = disable
      // Send discussion metadata periodically to the parent window: 1 = enable / 0 = disable
      metadata: '0',
      // theme example: light, dark, dark_dimmed, dark_high_contrast
      // transparent_dark, preferred_color_scheme, custom
      theme: 'light',
      // theme when dark mode
      darkTheme: 'transparent_dark',
      // If the theme option above is set to 'custom`
      // please provide a link below to your custom theme css file.
      // example: https://giscus.app/themes/custom_example.css
      themeURL: '',
    },
    utterancesConfig: {
      // Visit the link below, and follow the steps in the 'configuration' section
      // https://utteranc.es/
      repo: process.env.NEXT_PUBLIC_UTTERANCES_REPO,
      issueTerm: '', // supported options: pathname, url, title
      label: '', // label (optional): Comment 💬
      // theme example: github-light, github-dark, preferred-color-scheme
      // github-dark-orange, icy-dark, dark-blue, photon-dark, boxy-light
      theme: '',
      // theme when dark mode
      darkTheme: '',
    },
    disqus: {
      // https://help.disqus.com/en/articles/1717111-what-s-a-shortname
      shortname: process.env.NEXT_PUBLIC_DISQUS_SHORTNAME,
    },
  },

Multiple authors

Information on authors is now split from siteMetadata.js and stored in its own data/authors folder as a markdown file. Minimally, you will need to have a default.md file with authorship information. You can create additional files as required and the file name will be used as the reference to the author.

Here's how an author markdown file might look like:

default.md
---
name: Tails Azimuth
avatar: /static/images/avatar.png
occupation: Professor of Atmospheric Science
company: Stanford University
email: address@yoursite.com
twitter: https://twitter.com/Twitter
linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com
github: https://github.com
---

A long description of yourself...

You can use this information in multiple places across the template. For example in the about section of the page, we grab the default author information with this line of code:

const authorDetails = await getFileBySlug('authors', ['default'])

This is rendered in the AuthorLayout template.

Multiple authors in blog post

The frontmatter of a blog post accepts an optional authors array field. If no field is specified, it is assumed that the default author is used. Simply pass in an array of authors to render multiple authors associated with a post.

For example, the following frontmatter will display the authors given by data/authors/default.md and data/authors/sparrowhawk.md

title: 'My first post'
date: '2021-01-12'
draft: false
summary: 'My first post'
authors: ['default', 'sparrowhawk']

A demo of a multiple authors post is shown in Introducing Tailwind Nextjs Starter Blog post.

Copy button for code blocks

Hover over a code block and you will notice a GitHub-inspired copy button! You can modify ./components/Pre.js to further customise it. The component is passed to MDXComponents and modifies all <pre> blocks.

Line highlighting and line numbers

Line highlighting and line numbers are now supported out of the box thanks to the new rehype-prism-plus plugin

The following javascript code block:

```js {1, 3-4} showLineNumbers
var num1, num2, sum
num1 = prompt('Enter first number')
num2 = prompt('Enter second number')
sum = parseInt(num1) + parseInt(num2) // "+" means "add"
alert('Sum = ' + sum) // "+" means combine into a string
```

will appear as:

var num1, num2, sum
num1 = prompt('Enter first number')
num2 = prompt('Enter second number')
sum = parseInt(num1) + parseInt(num2) // "+" means "add"
alert('Sum = ' + sum) // "+" means combine into a string

To modify the styles, change the following class selectors in the prism.css file:

.code-highlight {
  @apply float-left min-w-full;
}

.code-line {
  @apply -mx-4 block border-l-4 border-opacity-0 pl-4 pr-4;
}

.code-line.inserted {
  @apply bg-green-500 bg-opacity-20;
}

.code-line.deleted {
  @apply bg-red-500 bg-opacity-20;
}

.highlight-line {
  @apply -mx-4 border-l-4 border-primary-500 bg-gray-700 bg-opacity-50;
}

.line-number::before {
  @apply -ml-2 mr-4 inline-block w-4 text-right text-gray-400;
  content: attr(line);
}

Newletter component (v1.1.3)

Introduced in v1.1.3, the newsletter component gives you an easy way to build an audience. It integrates with the following providers:

To use it, specify the provider which you are using in the config file and add the necessary environment variables to the .env file. For more information on the required variables, check out .env.sample.

Two components are exported, a default NewsletterForm and a BlogNewsletterForm component, which is also passed in as an MDX component and can be used in a blog post:

<BlogNewsletterForm title="Like what you are reading?" />
Subscribe to the newsletter

The component relies on nextjs's API routes which requires a server-side instance of nextjs to be setup and is not compatible with a 100% static site export. Users should either self-host or use a compatible platform like Vercel or Netlify which supports this functionality.

A static site compatible alternative is to substitute the route in the newsletter component with a form API endpoint provider.

Bibliography and Citations (v1.2.1)

rehype-citation plugin is added to the xdm processing pipeline in v1.2.1. This allows you to easily format citations and insert bibliography from an existing bibtex or CSL-json file.

For example, the following markdown code sample:

Standard citation [@Nash1950]
In-text citations e.g. @Nash1951
Multiple citations [see @Nash1950; @Nash1951, page 50]

**References:**

[^ref]

is rendered to the following:

Standard citation (Nash, 1950)
In-text citations e.g. Nash (1951)
Multiple citations (see Nash, 1950, 1951, p. 50)

References:

Nash, J. (1950). Equilibrium points in n-person games. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 36(1), 48–49.
Nash, J. (1951). Non-cooperative games. Annals of Mathematics, 286–295.

A bibliography will be inserted at the end of the document, but this can be overwritten by specifying a [^Ref] tag at the intended location. The plugin uses APA citation formation, but also supports the following CSLs, 'apa', 'vancouver', 'harvard1', 'chicago', 'mla', or a path to a user-specified CSL file.

See rehype-citation readme for more information on the configuration options.

Self-hosted font (v1.5.0)

Google font has been replaced with self-hosted font from Fontsource. This gives the following advantages:

Self-hosting brings significant performance gains as loading fonts from hosted services, such as Google Fonts, lead to an extra (render blocking) network request. To provide perspective, for simple websites it has been seen to double visual load times.

Fonts remain version locked. Google often pushes updates to their fonts without notice, which may interfere with your live production projects. Manage your fonts like any other NPM dependency.

Commit to privacy. Google does track the usage of their fonts and for those who are extremely privacy concerned, self-hosting is an alternative.

This leads to a smaller font bundle and a 0.1s faster load time (webpagetest comparison).

To change the default Inter font:

  1. Install the preferred font - npm install -save @fontsource/<font-name>
  2. Update the import at pages/_app.js- import '@fontsource/<font-name>.css'
  3. Update the fontfamily property in the tailwind css config file

Upgrade guide

There are significant portions of the code that has been changed from v0 to v1 including support for layouts and a new mdx engine.

There's also no real reason to change if the previous one serves your needs and it might be easier to copy the component changes you are interested in to your existing blog rather than migrating everything over.

Nonetheless, if you want to do so and have not changed much of the template, you could clone the new version and copy over the blog post over to the new template.

Another alternative would be to pull the latest template version with the following code:

git remote add template git@github.com:timlrx/tailwind-nextjs-starter-blog.git
git pull template v1 --allow-unrelated-histories
rm -rf node_modules

You can see an example of such a migration in this commit for my personal blog.

v1 also uses feed.xml rather than index.xml, to avoid some build issues with Vercel. If you are migrating you should add a redirect to next.config.js like so:

async redirects() {
  return [
    {
      source: '/:path/index.xml',
      destination: '/:path/feed.xml',
      permanent: true,
    }
  ]
}

Footnotes

  1. With the new changes in Nextjs 12, first load JS increase to 45kB. ↩

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