GitHub Pages - DAV-1000/react-material GitHub Wiki

Created: 8/13/2025 11:24
Updated: 8/13/2025 12:54
Exported: 8/14/2025 14:20
Link: https://chatgpt.com/c/689c67bb-e2bc-8321-9f23-72b1ca2bacd5

Tell me about github pages

GitHub Pages is GitHub’s free hosting service for static websites.

Here’s the rundown:

1. What it is

• GitHub Pages lets you publish HTML, CSS, and JavaScript files directly from a GitHub repository.
• It’s great for personal portfolios, project documentation, and small web apps that don’t need a backend.
• You can use a custom domain or the default username.github.io format.

2. How it works

• You create a public repository (can be private on paid plans).
• Put your website files in the correct branch (main, master, or gh-pages depending on setup).
• Enable GitHub Pages in the repository settings.
• GitHub automatically builds and serves your site.
• It works well with static site generators like Jekyll, Hugo, or Eleventy.

3. Limitations

• Static only — no server-side code (like PHP, Node.js, or databases) runs on GitHub Pages.
• Bandwidth and storage have soft limits (about 1 GB for repo size and 100 GB/month bandwidth).
• Sites are publicly visible unless hosted from a private repo with GitHub Pro or above.

4. Perks

• Free HTTPS with Let’s Encrypt.
• Version control built in (because it’s just Git).
• Easy integration with CI/CD workflows for automated site building.

If you want, I can walk you through setting up a GitHub Pages site in under 10 minutes.

I want to publish an existing static site already hosted on github to github pages from a new dedicated branch

Alright — you basically want to take your existing static site (already in a GitHub repo), put it into a new branch (like gh-pages), and then tell GitHub Pages to serve from that branch.

Here’s the step-by-step:

You can do this from your local repo or directly on GitHub.

From the command line (local repo):

# Make sure you have the latest changes
git checkout main
git pull

# Create the gh-pages branch from main
git checkout -b gh-pages

# Push it to GitHub
git push origin gh-pages

If your main branch has extra files (source code, build scripts, etc.) and you only want the built static site:

• Delete unneeded files from the gh-pages branch.
• Make sure index.html is at the root.
• Commit and push the changes:

git add .
git commit -m "Prepare static site for GitHub Pages"
git push

1. Go to your repo on GitHub.
2. Settings → Pages (sidebar).
3. Under Source, choose:
   • Branch: gh-pages
   • Folder: / (root)
4. Click Save.

GitHub will then deploy your site to:

https://<username>.github.io/<repo-name>/

• It usually takes 1–2 minutes.
• Check Actions tab if something fails.
• Refresh the Pages URL.

If your site needs to be built from source (e.g., with React, Vue, or Jekyll), you can:

• Keep source files on main
• Use a GitHub Action to auto-build and push output to gh-pages

If you tell me what kind of static site you have (plain HTML, React, Jekyll, etc.), I can give you the exact branch structure and deployment script so you don’t have to copy files manually.

It is a Vite React Typescipt site built with the Material UI blog template

Got it — you’ve got a Vite + React + TypeScript site based on Material UI’s blog template.
For Vite projects, you can’t just drop your src folder in gh-pages — you need to build the site, then publish the dist/ folder contents to your dedicated branch.

Here’s the clean approach:

If your repo name is my-blog, GitHub Pages will serve it from
https://<username>.github.io/my-blog/ (unless it’s your special username repo).
You need to tell Vite this so asset paths are correct.

Edit vite.config.ts:

import { defineConfig } from 'vite';
import react from '@vitejs/plugin-react';

// Replace 'my-blog' with your repo name
export default defineConfig({
  plugins: [react()],
  base: '/my-blog/', 
});

npm install
npm run build

This outputs a dist/ folder with the static files.

Instead of doing it manually, use the gh-pages npm package:

npm install --save-dev gh-pages

Add this to package.json scripts:

"scripts": {
  "build": "vite build",
  "deploy": "gh-pages -d dist"
}

Run:

npm run build
npm run deploy

That command:

• Builds the site
• Pushes the dist/ contents to a gh-pages branch
• Creates the branch if it doesn’t exist

• Go to Settings → Pages in your repo.
• Under Source, choose:
  Branch: gh-pages
  Folder: / (root)
• Save.

Your site will be live in ~1–2 minutes at:

https://<username>.github.io/my-blog/

If you want, I can also give you a GitHub Actions workflow so every time you push to main, it automatically builds and deploys to gh-pages without you running any commands.

Do you want me to set up that automatic deployment workflow?

I already have a gh-pages branch which contains all my source code. Is this compatible with the instructions above?

Not directly — the gh-pages branch that GitHub Pages serves from should only contain your built static site files (what Vite outputs in dist/), not your full source code.

Right now, since your gh-pages branch has all your React + TypeScript source, GitHub Pages will just try to serve that raw code, and the site won’t load properly in the browser.

You basically have two options:

1. Move all your source code back into main (or another branch, like dev).
2. Use the gh-pages npm package or GitHub Actions to overwrite the gh-pages branch with only the contents of your dist/ folder after building.
3. That branch will then be the actual deploy branch for GitHub Pages.

GitHub Pages can serve from a /docs folder in the same branch, so you could:

1. Build your Vite site with npm run build.
2. Move the dist/ folder into /docs in your gh-pages branch.
3. Set Pages → Source → Branch: gh-pages, Folder: /docs.

This keeps your source and build in the same branch, but it’s less clean for CI/CD automation.

Since you’re already on gh-pages, the quickest way right now is probably Option 2 — put your build in /docs and change the Pages setting to point there.

If you want a more professional setup for long-term maintenance, Option 1 is the standard — main branch for source, gh-pages branch for deploy output.

If you tell me whether you want fast fix or best practice, I can give you the exact commands to restructure your repo without breaking anything.

What if I create a branch gh-pages-src as the source for the deployment to the gh-pages branch

Yes — creating a gh-pages-src branch for your source code and reserving gh-pages only for built output is actually a neat, clean separation.

Here’s how that would work:

• gh-pages-src → contains all your React/TypeScript/Vite source code.
• gh-pages → contains only the dist/ folder contents from the build (no source files).
• GitHub Pages is configured to serve from gh-pages branch, / (root) folder.

git checkout gh-pages
git checkout -b gh-pages-src
git push origin gh-pages-src

git checkout gh-pages
git rm -rf .
git commit -m "Clear branch for deployment output"
git push origin gh-pages --force

Install the gh-pages npm package if you haven’t:

npm install --save-dev gh-pages

In package.json (in gh-pages-src branch):

"scripts": {
  "build": "vite build",
  "deploy": "gh-pages -d dist -b gh-pages"
}

Here:

• -d dist → tells it to publish from the build output folder.
• -b gh-pages → tells it to push to the gh-pages branch.

From gh-pages-src:

npm run build
npm run deploy

This will:

• Build your site into dist/
• Push only the built files to the gh-pages branch
• Leave gh-pages-src untouched

• Go to Settings → Pages
• Source: Branch: gh-pages, Folder: / (root)

This approach is nice because:

• Your source is never mixed with deployment output.
• You can easily recreate the gh-pages branch at any time from a fresh build.
• Works well with CI/CD automation.

If you want, I can write you a GitHub Actions workflow so that any push to gh-pages-src automatically builds and updates the gh-pages branch. That way, you never have to run the deploy command manually.

I received this error after running npm install --save-dev gh-pages: npm warn EBADENGINE Unsupported engine { npm warn EBADENGINE package: '[email protected]', npm warn EBADENGINE required: { node: '20.x' }, npm warn EBADENGINE current: { node: 'v22.14.0', npm: '10.9.2' } npm warn EBADENGINE }

That warning isn’t fatal — it’s npm telling you:

“The react-material package says it only supports Node 20.x, but you’re on Node 22.x.”

It’s basically a version mismatch warning, not an installation blocker.
The package likely still works fine in Node 22, it just wasn’t marked as “officially supported” in its package.json.

1. Ignore the warning
   • If your project runs and builds fine, you can just carry on.
   • This warning won’t stop gh-pages from working.
2. Downgrade to Node 20.x (if you want to match exactly)
   • Use a Node version manager (nvm, fnm, volta):

     nvm install 20
     nvm use 20

   • Then reinstall dependencies.
3. Update the engine requirement (only if you control the package)
   • Edit package.json in react-material and change:

     "engines": { "node": ">=20" }

     But this only works if react-material is your own local package.

✅ Bottom line: You can proceed with the deployment setup I outlined earlier even with that warning, unless you actually see build errors.

Do you want me to walk you through testing the deployment right now to confirm it works despite the warning?

Yes

Alright — let’s run through a quick deployment test to confirm that the npm WARN EBADENGINE isn’t stopping anything.

We’ll do it from your gh-pages-src branch (source code branch).

git checkout gh-pages-src
git pull

npm run build

✅ Expected: A dist/ folder appears with HTML, CSS, and JS files.
❌ If you see errors here, then the Node version might actually be an issue. But a warning alone won’t stop the build.

Run:

npm run deploy

(this assumes your package.json scripts are set like this)

"scripts": {
  "build": "vite build",
  "deploy": "gh-pages -d dist -b gh-pages"
}

✅ Expected output:

• It runs vite build (if not already built)
• Pushes the contents of dist/ to the gh-pages branch
• Shows a message like “Published”

1. Go to your repo’s Settings → Pages.
2. Make sure it’s:
   • Branch: gh-pages
   • Folder: / (root)
3. Wait ~1–2 minutes for deployment.

Visit:

https://<username>.github.io/<repo-name>/

It should load your Material UI blog site.

If everything builds and deploys, the warning you saw is purely cosmetic.
If Step 2 fails with a real error (not just a warning), then we’ll need to either downgrade Node to 20.x or relax the engines field.

Do you want me to also set you up with a GitHub Actions workflow so every time you push to gh-pages-src, it automatically builds and updates gh-pages? That would skip running npm run deploy manually.

The index page is loading but then a 404 is recorded in the console. The line <script type="module" crossorigin="" src="/assets/index-D1p-_xqa.js"></script> is failing because the correct url is /react-material/assets/index-D1p-_xqa.js

Ah — that’s exactly the Vite base path issue I mentioned earlier.

By default, Vite assumes your site is served from the root /.
But GitHub Pages serves your site from /<repo-name>/ unless it’s your special username.github.io repo.

Right now, your script tag is pointing to:

/assets/index-xxxx.js

but it needs to be:

/react-material/assets/index-xxxx.js

(where react-material is your repo name).

1. Open vite.config.ts
2. Add (or modify) the base property:

import { defineConfig } from 'vite';
import react from '@vitejs/plugin-react';

export default defineConfig({
  plugins: [react()],
  base: '/react-material/', // 👈 must match your repo name exactly
});

npm run build
npm run deploy

After this:

• The script tags will point to /<repo-name>/assets/...
• The 404 should disappear.
• The site should load fully on GitHub Pages.

If you change the repo name later, you must also update this base setting — otherwise, you’ll hit the same broken asset path problem.

Do you want me to also make sure your vite.config.ts works both locally and on GitHub Pages so you don’t have to keep editing it when switching environments? That’s a common annoyance we can solve.

This is my vite.config.ts in branch gh-pages-src: import { defineConfig } from 'vite' import react from '@vitejs/plugin-react'

// https://vite.dev/config/ export default defineConfig({ plugins: [react()], base: '/react-material/', })

Got it — your vite.config.ts in gh-pages-src already has

base: '/react-material/'

so the asset paths should be correct after a fresh build and deploy.

The 404 you saw likely happened because the version of the site currently in the gh-pages branch was built before you added that base setting.

From your gh-pages-src branch:

# Make sure local is up to date
git pull

# Clean any old dist
rm -rf dist

# Build fresh with the correct base path
npm run build

# Deploy to gh-pages branch
npm run deploy

This will:

1. Use your current vite.config.ts with base: '/react-material/'
2. Generate HTML that references /react-material/assets/...
3. Overwrite the gh-pages branch with the fixed build.

After a minute or so, reload:

https://<username>.github.io/react-material/

and check Network in dev tools — you shouldn’t see any 404s for /assets/....

If you want, I can also show you how to make vite.config.ts automatically set base to /react-material/ only when deploying to GitHub Pages, and / for local dev.
That way you don’t have to hardcode it. Would you like that setup?

Remove-Item : A parameter cannot be found that matches parameter name 'rf'. At line:1 char:4

• rm -rf dist

+ CategoryInfo          : InvalidArgument: (:) [Remove-Item], ParameterBindingException
+ FullyQualifiedErrorId : NamedParameterNotFound,Microsoft.PowerShell.Commands.RemoveItemCommand

Ah — you’re running this in PowerShell, not a Unix shell. In PowerShell, the rm -rf dist syntax doesn’t work.

The correct way to remove the dist folder in PowerShell is:

Remove-Item -Recurse -Force .\dist

Explanation:

• -Recurse → delete all files and subfolders
• -Force → override read-only files
• .\dist → path to the folder

So your workflow in PowerShell should be:

# Make sure you are on the source branch
git checkout gh-pages-src
git pull

# Remove old dist folder
Remove-Item -Recurse -Force .\dist

# Build the site
npm run build

# Deploy to gh-pages branch
npm run deploy

This will clean the old build, create a fresh dist/, and push the fixed build to gh-pages.

Do you want me to also show a cross-platform way to clean dist/ so it works on both Windows and Mac/Linux?

Maybe I didn't run build before deploy. Can we chain those two commands

Absolutely — you can chain the build and deploy commands so that npm run deploy automatically builds first. There are a few ways to do it, but the simplest is to update your package.json scripts.

"scripts": {
  "build": "vite build",
  "deploy": "npm run build && gh-pages -d dist -b gh-pages"
}

• npm run build && gh-pages -d dist -b gh-pages means:
  1. Run the build
  2. Only if it succeeds, push dist to gh-pages

Then you can just run:

npm run deploy

and it will build + deploy in one step.

NPM has a built-in hook for this:

"scripts": {
  "build": "vite build",
  "predeploy": "npm run build",
  "deploy": "gh-pages -d dist -b gh-pages"
}

• Running npm run deploy automatically triggers predeploy first.
• This is cleaner if you want a conventional flow.

Either way, it ensures you never forget to build before deploying.

Do you want me to rewrite your full package.json scripts section for the gh-pages-src branch so it’s ready to go?

The site is now loading but fails to load its data. The data path is a variable in the code with this value: /data/blogPosts.json. How can I add the value of base from vite.config.ts to this variable

Ah — that makes sense. Right now your code is trying to fetch:

/data/blogPosts.json

…but on GitHub Pages it should be:

/react-material/data/blogPosts.json

(where /react-material/ is the base path in vite.config.ts).

You can dynamically prepend the base path from Vite so it works both locally (/) and on GitHub Pages.

Vite exposes the base path at runtime as import.meta.env.BASE_URL.

Example in your code:

// Instead of hardcoding
// const dataPath = '/data/blogPosts.json';

// Use Vite's base
const dataPath = `${import.meta.env.BASE_URL}data/blogPosts.json`;

// Fetch data
fetch(dataPath)
  .then(res => res.json())
  .then(posts => {
    console.log(posts);
  });

✅ Advantages:

• Works locally (BASE_URL = /)
• Works on GitHub Pages (BASE_URL = /react-material/)
• No hardcoding, fully automatic

1. Update your code to use import.meta.env.BASE_URL as above.
2. Run:

npm run deploy

3. Reload your site — the JSON should now load correctly.

If you want, I can also show a TypeScript-friendly helper function so you can always fetch assets relative to BASE_URL without rewriting all fetch calls. This is nice for a blog with multiple JSON or image files. Do you want me to do that?

The deployed site is here: https://dav-1000.github.io/react-material/

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