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A first post on the Byzantine Systems blog explains a publishing workflow that starts with Org-mode documents written in Emacs, converts them with Pandoc, and generates a site through Blogatto and Gleam. The author says the setup keeps writing, code, citations and diagrams together while using Nix to pin the build environment; the post does not provide benchmarks or a comparison with other systems.
Byzantine Systems has published a first post describing a blog-publishing workflow built around Emacs Org-mode, Pandoc and a small Gleam-based site pipeline. The author says the setup lets them write in Org documents while converting posts to Markdown and generating HTML, an approach intended to keep writing and technical material in one authoring environment without requiring a separate template language.
The process begins with Org files written in Emacs. The author says Pandoc converts those documents into Markdown, which Blogatto then uses to generate the final HTML. Gleam supplies the typed site-generation code, and Lustre is used to define HTML elements such as the page listing posts. The example in the post sorts posts by date and builds a list of links.
The post also describes Nix, flakes and devenv as tools for pinning and managing the build environment. For diagrams, the author uses d2 with Org-mode’s Babel features, so diagram source can live alongside the writing and be rendered into an image. The author’s stated aim is to interact primarily with Org documents while leaving the publishing steps to the build pipeline.
Markdown remains part of the workflow, but the author says they do not write posts in it directly. In their account, Org-mode supports plain-text writing as well as embedded source blocks, generated results and citations. The post presents these as reasons for choosing Org-mode, rather than as measured advantages over other publishing tools.
Keeping Writing and Publishing Together
The workflow offers a concrete example for writers who want code, diagrams and citations alongside ordinary prose, without manually moving material between separate editors. Org-mode serves as the authoring format, while Pandoc and Blogatto handle conversion and site generation. That division allows the author to keep a familiar writing environment while producing pages through a separate build pipeline.
There is also a practical trade-off. The approach combines several tools—Emacs, Pandoc, Gleam, Lustre and Nix—which may provide a structured and typed publishing system but also require readers to learn and maintain multiple components. The post explains why its author prefers this arrangement; it does not establish that the setup is faster, simpler to operate or more reliable than a conventional static-site generator.
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From Org Documents to HTML
The post is framed as the launch of the Byzantine Systems blog, but the author says this is not their first attempt to build a site around Org-mode. They refer to an earlier personal-blog setup that used Emacs, scripts and Nix, and say they wanted to preserve writing in Emacs while making the publishing side smaller, typed and easier to understand.
The author situates the choice within a broader preference for keeping related work in one environment. They describe writing as more than composing paragraphs: posts may include source code, notes and working BibTeX citations. Org-mode’s ability to combine prose and executable source blocks is central to the case they make, while Pandoc provides a conversion step that lets the final site consume Markdown.
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What the Post Does Not Measure
The account is a description of one developer’s setup, not an independent evaluation. It does not report build times, maintenance costs, reliability results or a direct comparison with other blogging systems. It also does not establish whether the workflow is intended for use by other contributors or how easily a new user could reproduce it.
The supplied post gives an example of Gleam code for a post index and describes the conversion stages, but does not provide enough information to assess every implementation detail, such as deployment arrangements or the full handling of citations and generated assets. The source also does not state when the post was published.
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The Workflow’s Next Steps
The blog post describes a working publishing experiment, but does not announce a release schedule, planned features or a wider rollout. The author identifies bringing more work into Emacs as a longer-term goal, while acknowledging that the current system still relies on separate tools for conversion, site generation and environment management.
Readers looking to reproduce the setup would need to consult the original post for its code and build details. Whether the author expands the pipeline, publishes further posts about it or changes components remains unknown from the available source.
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Key Questions
What is the main development described?
The Byzantine Systems blog’s first post documents a workflow that uses Org-mode for authoring, Pandoc for conversion, and Blogatto with Gleam to generate a website.
Does the author write blog posts in Markdown?
No. The author says posts are written as Org-mode documents; Pandoc converts them to Markdown for Blogatto to consume.
What do Nix and d2 do in the setup?
The author says Nix, flakes and devenv pin and manage the build environment. The d2 tool is used to create diagrams from source kept with the Org content.
Does the post show that this workflow is better than other options?
No. It explains the author’s reasons for choosing the tools, but supplies no benchmarks or comparative evaluation of performance, reliability or maintenance effort.
Source: hn
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