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This guide walks you through a straightforward method of deploying a static website at low cost and complexity. Follow along to host your own website, using your own domain name.

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I’m a software engineer. And yet, my presence on the internet is practically confined to LinkedIn. I want somewhere less constrained where I can display some of the skills I’ve developed.

I have $20 for a domain name, how hard can it be to whip something up?

This is not a new problem, but that means there’s an excess of conflicting advice for how to accomplish website publishing. I tried and failed a few times before arriving at a version of success. Follow along to learn my current recipe for how to host a custom static website!

Ingredients

Steps

  1. Get SSH access to your Linux machine
  2. Install nginx
  3. Add your website files
  4. Configure nginx with your Server IP
  5. Setup your Domain with DNS Records
  6. Install and Run Certbot
  7. Conclusion / Rating My Solution

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checkout my current live site!

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Get SSH Access to Your Linux Machine

Let’s talk about this first ingredient. When I say you need a ‘Linux Machine’ I mean some real hardware to run your web server on. If you have an extra server lying around, that’s crazy, definitely use that.