Today marks the beginning of “A Human in the Loop” - my new blog about exploring technology and creative development. I thought it fitting that my first post should detail how I built this blog, especially since I used AI (specifically Claude) to help me through the process.

Creating a blog with Claude

Here’s how we did it:

  1. Set up the development environment on my MacBook:
    • Installed and configured Ruby via Homebrew
    • Installed Jekyll and necessary gems
    • Learned about managing Ruby paths (which was trickier than expected!)
  2. Created the blog structure:
    • Set up a new GitHub repository
    • Initialized Jekyll with the minima theme
    • Configured the basic settings in _config.yml
  3. Customized the design:
    • Chose the minima theme as a clean starting point
    • Created custom CSS structure
    • Began personalizing the color scheme

Throughout this process, Claude guided me step by step, troubleshooting issues as they arose. One interesting challenge was dealing with Ruby gem paths and dependencies - a reminder that even “simple” projects often have hidden complexity.

What I found particularly helpful about using Claude was its ability to explain not just what to do, but why we were doing it. This helped me understand the structure of Jekyll blogs better, rather than just blindly following commands.

Next Steps:

  • Fine-tune the design
  • Add more content sections
  • Set up categories and tags
  • Create an about page

Stay tuned as I continue to develop both this blog and my skills in the ever-evolving tech landscape. This is just the beginning of documenting my journey to stay current with technology while maintaining that crucial human element in the loop.

Feel free to follow along or reach out if you’re on a similar jou