[Jekyll][1] is simple static content compiler popularized by [GitHub Pages][2]. If you use Jekyll in a GitHub repo a static website will automatically be created for you by running Jekyll on your content sources (e.g. Markdown). That works well but there are cases where it is nice to deploy a Jekyll site on Heroku. After trying (and failing) to follow many of the existing blogs about running Jekyll on Heroku, I cornered my coworker [Terence Lee][3] and got some help. Turns out it is pretty simple.

Not interested in the details? Skip right to [a diff that makes a Jekyll site deployable on Heroku][4] or start from scratch:
  
[![Deploy on Heroku][5]][6] 

Here are the step by step instructions:

1. Add a `Gemfile` in the Jekyll project root containing:
    ```txt
    source 'https://rubygems.org'
    ruby '2.1.2'
    gem 'jekyll'
    gem 'kramdown'
    gem 'rack-jekyll'
    gem 'rake'
    gem 'puma'
    ```

2. Run: `bundler install`
3. Create a `Procfile` telling Heroku how to serve the web site with Puma:
    ```txt
    web: bundle exec puma -t 8:32 -w 3 -p $PORT
    ```

4. Create a `Rakefile` which tells Heroku's slug compiler to build the Jekyll site as part of the `assets:precompile` Rake task:
    ```txt
    namespace :assets do
      task :precompile do
        puts `bundle exec jekyll build`
      end
    end
    ```

5. Add the following lines to the `_config.yml` file:
    ```yaml
    gems: ['kramdown']
    exclude: ['config.ru', 'Gemfile', 'Gemfile.lock', 'vendor', 'Procfile', 'Rakefile']
    ```

6. Add a `config.ru` file containing:
    ```ruby
    require 'rack/jekyll'
    require 'yaml'
    run Rack::Jekyll.new
    ```

That is it! When you do the usual `git push heroku master` deployment, the standard Ruby Buildpack will kick off the Jekyll compiler and when your app runs, Puma will serve the static assets. If you are starting from scratch just clone my [jekyll-heroku][7] repo and you should have everything you need.

To run Jekyll locally using the dependencies in the project, run:

```bash
bundle exec jekyll serve --watch
```

Let me know how it goes.

 [1]: http://jekyllrb.com/
 [2]: https://pages.github.com/
 [3]: https://twitter.com/hone02
 [4]: https://github.com/jamesward/jekyll-heroku/commit/8054bb8df3bcddedbb120d621c880f7e4ccdfc4b
 [5]: https://www.herokucdn.com/deploy/button.png
 [6]: https://heroku.com/deploy?template=https://github.com/jamesward/jekyll-heroku
 [7]: https://github.com/jamesward/jekyll-heroku