Why GitBook?

Requirements:

• Easy maintenance

• Git/file system support

  • In theory, easy migration to different platforms

  • Doesn't require me to have internet access

  • I can easily do a grep or ack locally to find information.

  • Markdown support

• • Easy styling

Pros:

• Nice UI

• Decent free Basic plan

  • Includes one free private book

• No need to always use command line

• Custom domains

• Google Analytics support

• ​Syncs with GitHub​

  • Bi-directional support

  • I can make hooks into GitBook via GitHub hooks, see gitbook-summary​

• Renaming pages appears to maintain old URLs

  • Only if it is not moved to a different folder

• Works decently on my 11” iPad Pro 2018

  • Browsing is fine on quarter, half or full screen

  • Can’t use Safari’s split screen mode for editing

    • Require’s using full screen, sad

• Works 1146px width (UWQD Display: 3440 / 3)

Cons:

• Organizing a lot of pages is difficult, even if nested

  • I currently have 59 pages and its difficult to reorganize

  • I may have to organize things on the filesystem/markdown

  • I could potentially move to a second GitBook, but I like everything organized in one for now

• Long pages can be very confusing

  • Better to break out the content into different pages

  • Increases the problem of organizing a lot of pages

• Content is not really "static"

• No sitemap.xml

  • Feature Request https://gitbook.canny.io/feature-requests/p/sitemap​

Dislikes:

• Doesn't use same header shortcuts as Google Docs

Limitations:

• See GitBook and GitHub Limitations​

• Single theme

  • I don't really mind it. It's a decent but most importantly, usable theme.

• Logs to git commit history could be nicer

• No offline read/write support

  • Workaround is to download the repository

• Moving pages doesn't redirect to new URL

  • For renaming pages in the same directory structure, the old url still works

  • For moving pages into a different directory, the old url will not work

• I tried to compile a version using their gitbook-cli tool but it failed on notes/javascript/fetch.md

  • ​https://www.npmjs.com/package/gitbook​

Facts:

• GitBook stores assets/images under .gitbook/assets​

• Assets retain their filename

Other static site generators: https://www.staticgen.com​

Previously using Phenomic. cons: Fully manual.

Other notable GitBooks:

• ​Nikita Voloboev​