For pelican blogs there is only the requirement of a webserver on the hosting site, as it is all static pages. On the client side (to write blog articles) it is recommended to use python2.7 with virtualenv installed. For debian/ubuntu it is:

apt-get install python2.7 python2.7-dev python-virtualenv 

To create a virtual environment and change into it:

$ virtualenv ~/virtualenvs/pelican
$ cd ~/virtualenvs/pelican
$ . bin/activate

you need to change into that virtualenv whenever working and generating your blog.

Install via pip in the virtual environment:

$ pip install pelican

We do use Markdown and Typogrify for blog.torservers.net:

$ pip install Markdown typogrify

To start a new pelicanblog use and answer the questions accordingly:

$ pelican-quickstart

For the existing blog:

$ git clone https://github.com/torservers/blog.torservers.net

Make your changes, most likely changing blog articles in ./content/ . You can quick regenerate the output by running make html. We prefer fabric:

$ pip install Fabric

To create the blog from markdown:

$ fab build

To quickly test locally (it will be accessible on http://localhost:8000 ):

$ fab serve

To upload the blog to your webserver use, your public key needs to be on blog.torservers.net for the blog user.

$ fab publish

To use Markdown your files need to end in .md, .markdown, .mkd or mdown in content/

To change the theme (and other settings) for your blog edit yor pelicanconf.py. To get all kinds of themes:

$ git clone --recursive https://github.com/getpelican/pelican-themes ~/pelican-themes

And edit your pelicanconf.py to include:

THEME = "/home/user/pelican-themes/theme-name"

In our case we do have the theme copied within the repo under theme THEME = "theme/

For a comprehensive guide to getting started: http://docs.getpelican.com/en/latest/getting_started.html For themes: https://github.com/getpelican/pelican-themes