
Let's say you've built an nice new static site using Next.js and you want to host it on GitHub Pages. Well there's a few steps to get it working, but it isn't too hard.

![next js logo and github logo](./NextJSGitHubPagesHero.png)

This article assumes you already have a website built locally and you're just looking to host it on [GitHub Pages](https://docs.github.com/en/pages/getting-started-with-github-pages). In the future I may write some how-tos for creating a blog using markdown and Next.js.

In this example I'm going to outline how I deploy to my main GitHub Pages repo for [superflux.dev](https://superflux.dev). It's hosted in my GitHub account's [main Pages repository](https://github.com/tyrelh/tyrelh.github.io). Everyone has access to this special repo. Just create a new repo with the title _your-github-username.github.io_. GitHub will serve the static content there on your own subdomain `https://your-github-username.github.io`. You can even connect a custom domain like I did, I'll talk about that optionally at the end.

You can also use this tutorial to push repo-specific pages. Google for that if your unfamiliar.

## Tl;dr

* [Static content](#static-content): A quick overview of how to build static assets for a Next.js site.
* [Install gh-pages package](#install-gh-pages-package): There's a lovely NPM package that makes it very simple to deploy static assets to GitHub Pages.
* [Branch setup](#branch-setup): I use two repositories on GitHub, one for my source code and one that is the Pages repository that gets hosted under your username.
* [Deploy script](#deploy-script): The deploy script uses the *gh-pages* package.
	* [Static content directory](#static-content-directory): Set the *out* directory in the deploy script that Next.js outputs static assets to when building and exporting.
	* [Remote & branch](#remote--branch): Set the remote and the branch that you want *gh-pages* to push your static assets to.
	* [Force push to remote](#force-push-to-remote): Allow the deploy script to force-push changes to your GitHub Pages repo.
	* [\_next hidden folder](#_next-hidden-folder): Some tweaks to make GitHub Pages play nicely with Next.js
* [\[Optional\] Configure a custom domain](#optional-configure-a-custom-domain): Allow a GitHub Pages site to be served over a custom domain name.
* [Resources](#resources)
* [Conclusion](#conclusion)

## Static content

GitHub Pages can only serve static content. You need to be able to export your Next.js project to static code. You can do this by running

```shell
next build && next export
```

`next export` will export the static code for your project to the _out/_ directory. This is the code we're going to want to host on GitHub Pages.

To simplify and make it easy to remember I added this as a `build` script in my *package.json*. Add/edit the `build` script:

```json
"build": "next build && next export"
```

## Install gh-pages package

I've used this package in the past and it works well for GitHub Pages websites. *[gh-pages](https://github.com/tschaub/gh-pages)* is a simple little tool that makes it easy to push projects to GitHub Pages repos or branches.

```shell
npm install gh-pages --save-dev
```

## Branch setup

I store my website source in a separate repository, in my case a repo called [personal-site-nextjs](https://github.com/tyrelh/personal-site-nextjs). By default *gh-pages* will deploy your static site to the `origin` remote. But we can change that. I like to keep the `origin` for my source repo pointing to the source remote.

* `personal-site-nextjs`: repo containing the source code for my website. I do development here
* `tyrelh.github.io`: my main GitHub Pages repo. This is were the compiled static assets are served from

You can also just use separate branches in the same GitHub Pages repository if you prefer. One for the source and one for the public assets. That feels messy to me so I prefer to keep them separate.

## Deploy script

Next we'll setup a deploy script in our _package.json_ to deploy our static content!

In your _package.json_ create a new script. Remember it should be on the same level as the other scripts, in the `"scripts"` block:

```json
"deploy": "gh-pages"
```

Now this by itself wont work yet, but I'm going to step you through each additional step to get the `gh-pages` command working. If you want to [skip to the end and just see the final script](#conclusion), go ahead!

### Static content directory

First you want to tell it what directory that your static assets are in. Remember this is the directory that `next export` in your `build` script outputs to. By default this is the _out/_ directory in your project. Make sure you run your build script first so that your static files are here.

Use the `-d` flag to set the directory.

```json
"deploy": "gh-pages -d out
```

### Remote & branch

We want to make sure `gh-pages` knows where it should push our static code to for hosting. It's good to set this up first so you don't accidentally push code somewhere you don't intend to.

For the `gh-pages` command, you can use the `-b` flag to tell it the remote branch you want to push to. Whatever the default branch of your _username.github.io_ repo is will work. `main` or `master` for example.

```json
"deploy": "gh-pages -d out -b main"
```

Next you'll want to set the remote. I like to hard code this in the script itself. Since it's going to be static for this project I don't see any reason not to. You can use the `-r` flag to set a remote URL. Copy the remote URL from your _username.github.io_ repo.

```json
"deploy": "gh-pages -d out -b main -r https://github.com/tyrelh/tyrelh.github.io.git"
```

### Force Push to Remote

When deploying new static content to your GitHub Pages repo, generally you're going to want to overwrite what is there. At least this is the simplest way to do it. Before setting this just double check that your branch and remote are set correctly. You don't want to overwrite anything you don't intend to!

Use the `-f` flag to force the push to the remote, overwriting files and changes that may exist on the remote.

```json
"deploy": "gh-pages -d out -b main -r https://github.com/tyrelh/tyrelh.github.io.git -f"
```

Ok! We're almost there! If this was a Jekyll project, or maybe a standard React project this would probably be all you need. But since we're using Next.js there is one more piece of config we need to do.

### \_next Hidden Folder

In your _out/_ directory of static assets, you should see a folder called _\_next/_. This is where Next.js puts your compiled JavaScript and CSS.

By default, GitHub pages actually ignores folders beginning with a \_. This is because GitHub Pages is setup to use Jekyll. Jekyll considers folders beginning with \_ to be hidden folders, so GitHub Pages just doesn't serve them.

You can deploy the code as is, and it will look like it worked since you can see the _\_next/_ directory in you _username.github.io_ repo. But any requests to those assets when you visit your website will result in a 404 not found error.

To fix this you need to add a file named _.nojekyll_ to the root of your _username.github.io_ repo. You can do this right on the GitHub website to test it out. Once that file is there and you give it a couple minutes to take effect, your website should work without 404 errors!

But now if you deploy your static code again that file will get erased, breaking your website. We need to incorporate this file into our deploy or build scripts. I put it at the beginning of my deploy script, but you could also put it at the end of your build script too if that makes more sense to you.

We want to create that `.nojekyll` file in our _out/_ directory after our code is built, but before we deploy it using `gh-pages`.

At the beginning of your deploy script, add an `echo` command to create the file. The file can contain anything, I just echo the string `true`. Use the `&&` between the `echo` and `gh-pages` commands so that they will run sequentially.

```json
"deploy": "echo 'true' > ./out/.nojekyll && gh-pages -d out -b main -r https://github.com/tyrelh/tyrelh.github.io.git -f"
```

This wont quite work, because by default `gh-pages` ignores hidden dotfiles! To tell `gh-pages` you want to include dotfiles (that's files beginning with a .), use the `-t` flag on the `gh-pages` command.

```json
"deploy": "echo 'true' > ./out/.nojekyll && gh-pages -d out -b main -r https://github.com/tyrelh/tyrelh.github.io.git -f -t"
```

And that's basically it!

## Configure your repo for GitHub Pages

You'll need to make sure your repo is configured for Pages. Go to your repo, click on the repo _Settings_, and click _Pages_ on the settings side bar. See the [GitHub Pages docs](https://docs.github.com/en/pages/getting-started-with-github-pages) for more general info about hosting static content.

## \[Optional\] Configure a custom domain

After you follow the [instructions here](https://docs.github.com/en/pages/configuring-a-custom-domain-for-your-github-pages-site/managing-a-custom-domain-for-your-github-pages-site) to setup your custom domain with your GitHub Pages website, you'll notice that you need a _CNAME_ file in the root of your repo for the domain to map correctly.

Since our deploy process overwrites all the files in our GitHub Pages repo on each deploy, we need to add this file to our deploy/build process so it will be included each time. This is similar to what we needed to do for the _.nojekyll_ file.

At the beginning of your deploy script, add another `echo` command. You want to output the root domain for your website to a file called _CNAME_. In my case my root domain is `superflux.dev`.

```json
"deploy": "echo 'superflux.dev' > ./out/CNAME && echo 'true' > ./out/.nojekyll && gh-pages -d out -b main -r https://github.com/tyrelh/tyrelh.github.io.git -f -t"
```

Make sure to include the `&&` between each command so they run sequentially!

## Resources

* Allow the _\_next_ folder to get picked up in repo: https://github.blog/2009-12-29-bypassing-jekyll-on-github-pages/
* `gh-pages` package to easily deploy to GitHub Pages repositories: https://github.com/tschaub/gh-pages
* GitHub Pages docs: https://docs.github.com/en/pages/getting-started-with-github-pages
* GitHub Pages custom domain docs: https://docs.github.com/en/pages/configuring-a-custom-domain-for-your-github-pages-site/managing-a-custom-domain-for-your-github-pages-site

## Conclusion

And now that's it! To summarize we built a deploy script in our _package.json_ that looks like this

```json
"deploy": "echo 'true' > ./out/.nojekyll && gh-pages -d out -b main -r https://github.com/tyrelh/tyrelh.github.io.git -f -t"
```

You'll want to make sure your `-b` branch is pointing to the branch being served on your GitHub Pages repo, and that the `-r` remote is the URL of your GitHub Pages repo.

After building your website locally just run `npm run deploy` to push your static code to your GitHub Pages site! Remember the `gh-pages` package uses _git_ to push code to the remotes, so you'll need to configure your username, email, and credentials to authenticate the push to your GitHub Pages repo.

Reach out to me on Twitter [@tyreldelaney](https://twitter.com/tyreldelaney) if you have any questions, comments, or suggestions!

*Note: this article was written in April 2022. It sat for a while in my queue of articles as we were gearing up to have our first child. Hopefully nothing has changed drastically with Next.js and GitHub Pages that renders this info unusable.*

Deploy a Next.js Static Site to GitHub Pages

Node CI/CD Pipeline using GitHub Actions & AWS Elastic Beanstalk


During a recent project to convert my JavaScript & Node [Battlesnake](https://play.battlesnake.com/) over to TypeScript & [Deno](https://deno.land/), I decided I would also create a more robust suite of tests for it.

![Deno and Github logos with an addition symbol between them](DenoTestsAndGithubActionsCI.png)

If you are unfamiliar with [Battlesnake](https://play.battlesnake.com/), it is an online and in-person programming competition where you build a AI in the form of a REST API that can play a multiplayer version of the classic game [Snake](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snake_(video_game_genre). You can check out details on their [website](https://play.battlesnake.com/) to learn more, and even watch some past events on their [Twitch channel](https://www.twitch.tv/BattlesnakeOfficial).

## Tl;dr
* [Deno Tests](#deno-tests): Deno includes a very simple test runner framework.
* [Github Actions](#github-actions): Github actions allow you to automate tasks based on triggers within your Github repo.
* [Create the workflow](#create-the-workflow): A .yml file describes a series of actions you would like to perform based on a trigger.
* [Automate Deno tests](#automate-deno-tests): Just add a `run: deno test` command to your workflow .yml.

## Deno Tests
[Deno](https://deno.land/) includes a simple test runner for tests in js, ts, jsx, or tsx files. It can be run with:

```bash
deno test
```

To create tests, all you need to use is use the `Deno.test()` method included with Deno within files ending in *test* (`{*_,}test.{js,ts,jsx,tsx}`) anywhere in your project structure. I put mine in *tests/*.

Example of a basic test:

```typescript
import { assert } from "https://deno.land/std/testing/asserts.ts";
import { root } from "../app/main.ts";

Deno.test("Root response contains expected fields", () => {
  // when
  const result = root();
  // then
  assert(result?.apiversion);
  assert(result?.author);
  assert(result?.head);
  assert(result?.tail);
  assert(result?.color);
});
```

This test is simply asserting that values exist for these specified fields.

You can add many tests to single files by calling `Deno.test()` over and over again. You can also make as many test files as you like, Deno will automatically execute all the files it recognizes ending in *test* (`{*_,}test.{js,ts,jsx,tsx}`).

Visit the [Deno Testing docs](https://deno.land/manual/testing) for more info about creating tests.

Easy! So now I can create a robust set of unit tests for my Battlesnake AI.

Since the game Battlesnake works by [sending you the entire game state for every move](https://docs.battlesnake.com/references/api), I can also save the game state JSON from particularly tricky moves and use them within their own tests. The output can be compared against the single best move, or even a set of equally good moves if their are multiple. Creating tests like this tests the behaviour of the AI overall and ensures that changes to the behaviour aren't making the AI perform worse on moves it previously was able to do correctly.

So now that I have tests up and working, I wanted to automate them using Github Actions.

## Github Actions
Github Actions are still quite new to me and I hadn't touched them at all before this project. I just assumed it would be complicated to set up.

For what I wanted to do for this project it was actually trivial. Couldn't have been easier.

What I wanted was to run these tests automatically whenever pushing to my repository. I figured this Deno app is pretty simple all things considered, so I shouldn't have to mess around with Docker or anything like that.

I'll step you through what I did.

## Create the workflow
Github Actions are based around these things called workflows. They are essentially .yml scripts that describe the series of events you want to perform in your action.

If you click the Actions tab within the repo you want to create the Action you will be presented with a Get started with GitHub Actions page. This page has many example actions you get you started for so many different languages, frameworks, and platforms. It will even suggest actions to you based on the contents of your repo. I chose the *Skip this asn set up a workflow yourself* option.

![Get started with Github Actions](DenoAndGithubActions-get-started-with-github-actions.png)

This plops you into a web editor and gives you a basic example workflow .yml file to start with. It looks something like this:

```yaml
# This is a basic workflow to help you get started with Actions

name: CI

# Controls when the action will run. Triggers the workflow on push or pull request
# events but only for the master branch
on:
  push:
    branches: [ master ]
  pull_request:
    branches: [ master ]

# A workflow run is made up of one or more jobs that can run sequentially or in parallel
jobs:
  # This workflow contains a single job called "build"
  build:
    # The type of runner that the job will run on
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest

    # Steps represent a sequence of tasks that will be executed as part of the job
    steps:
    # Checks-out your repository under $GITHUB_WORKSPACE, so your job can access it
    - uses: actions/checkout@v2

    # Runs a single command using the runners shell
    - name: Run a one-line script
      run: echo Hello, world!

    # Runs a set of commands using the runners shell
    - name: Run a multi-line script
      run: |
        echo Add other actions to build,
        echo test, and deploy your project.

```

With this you can actually click the *Start commit* button and that will guide you to commit this .yml file to your repo within the *.github/workflows/* directory.

You can see near the top of that file that there are triggers for `on push` and `on pull_request` attached to the master branch. You can try to push something to master and see it work!

If you visit the Actions tab of your repo now you will see your Actions and the history of all the times they have run. You can click into them for more details and to see the console outputs. Also by default it will email your Github account email whenever an action fails. I imagine this can be changed somewhere if you don't like that.

![Github Actions](DenoAndGithubActions-github-actions.png)

## Automate Deno tests
Now I wanted to try to run my tests using Deno. I knew this would involve installing Deno somehow so I searched around.

I found [this repo](https://github.com/denolib/setup-deno) from [denolib](https://github.com/denolib) with exactly what I wanted.

Really all you need to do is add the `uses` line pointing to this repo to your workflow .yml file under the `steps` section. You can also include the Deno version you prefer. Then within the `run` section you now have access to `deno` and all of its functions.

So now my workflow .yml file looks like this:

```yaml
name: CI

on:
  push:
    branches: [ master ]
  pull_request:
    branches: [ master ]

jobs:
  build:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest

    steps:
    - uses: actions/checkout@master
    - uses: denolib/setup-deno@master
      with:
        deno-version: v1.x
    - run: deno run https://deno.land/std/examples/welcome.ts
```

One really cool feature of Deno is that you can run scripts from the web right in the terminal, and you can also do this right within Github Actions. That is what the URL is doing in

```yaml
- run: deno run https://deno.land/std/examples/welcome.ts
```

You can run this and then look within your Github Actions for the console output from this example *welcome.ts* file.

So now to run my tests, all I needed to do was change that `deno run` command to `deno test`. My final .yml workflow looks something like this:

```yaml
name: CI

on:
  push:
    branches: [ master ]
  pull_request:
    branches: [ master ]

jobs:
  run-tests:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest

    steps:
    - uses: actions/checkout@master
    - uses: denolib/setup-deno@master
      with:
        deno-version: v1.x
    - run: deno test
```

Now every time I push to my master branch all my tests will be run, including any new tests I just committed, and I will be notified both on the Github UI and in my email if any tests fail. I can then log into Github and look at the output to see what failed.

I hope this small guide helped you out and showed you just how simple both Deno and Github Actions are!

#typescript

Deploy a Next.js Static Site to GitHub Pages

July 23, 2023 8 Minute Read

Node CI/CD Pipeline using GitHub Actions & AWS Elastic Beanstalk

May 30, 2020 24 Minute Read

Deno Tests & GitHub Actions CI

May 23, 2020 6 Minute Read

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