Git-Based Publishing Pattern

A pattern I’ve been exploring for over a decade: store content in a raw, simple form — ideally plain text or Markdown — inside a Git repository. From there, generate publications through lightweight rendering tools. The idea is to treat text like code: versioned, inspectable, forkable, and transparent.

The principle is simplicity — the Unix philosophy for publishing. Everything is a pipe: small, open tools working together. This allows anyone to reproduce, remix, and republish without proprietary systems or complex CMS layers.

I’d already used this approach in Open Shakespeare, and later saw parallel experiments like Gitenberg.

The pattern remains powerful: open, composable, and enduring.

---

A method for storing and publishing textual material (e.g. reports, datasets, literature) using Git as the backend:

• Keep source material as plain text (Markdown or similar).
• Store and version it in Git repositories.
• Use lightweight rendering tools to generate websites or documents.
• Follow the Unix philosophy: small, composable tools; text as the universal interface.
• Publish as static sites rather than dynamic CMS-driven systems.

This pattern enables openness, durability, reproducibility, and simplicity — a decentralized infrastructure for public knowledge.