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Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://mintlify.com/apursley2012/press-start/llms.txt

Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

Press Start is designed to deploy to GitHub Pages out of the box. Because the build output is fully static HTML, JavaScript, and CSS, GitHub Pages can serve it with zero server configuration. The repo already includes a .nojekyll file and a complete set of per-route HTML shells under pages/ so that direct URL navigation works correctly without any redirect rules.

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Deployment steps

1

Fork or clone the repository

Start with your own copy of the repo so you can push changes and configure GitHub Pages under your account:
git clone https://github.com/your-username/press-start.git
cd press-start
npm install
Replace your-username with your GitHub username after forking.
2

Build with Vite

Compile the React application into the static dist/ directory:
npm run build
Vite writes dist/index.html, dist/assets/main.js, dist/assets/main.css, and the full set of dist/pages/*.html shells. The build typically finishes in a few seconds.
3

Configure GitHub Pages in repository Settings

In your GitHub repository, navigate to Settings → Pages.
  • Source: select the branch that contains your built files (usually main or a dedicated gh-pages branch).
  • Folder: set to / (root) if the built files are at the repo root, or /dist if you push only the dist/ contents.
Save the settings. GitHub Pages will begin building and publishing — a green banner with your live URL appears once it finishes.
4

Push the built files

Commit and push the dist/ output (or the files within it) to the branch you configured above.Option A — commit dist/ to main:
git add dist/
git commit -m "chore: add production build"
git push origin main
Option B — push dist/ contents to a gh-pages branch:
git subtree push --prefix dist origin gh-pages
With Option B, set the GitHub Pages source branch to gh-pages and folder to / (root).
5

Access your live site

Once GitHub Pages finishes deploying, your portfolio is available at:
https://[username].github.io/press-start/
Replace [username] with your GitHub username and press-start with your repository name if you renamed the fork. Each route is accessible directly, for example https://[username].github.io/press-start/pages/About.html.

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The .nojekyll file

The repo root contains an empty file named .nojekyll. By default, GitHub Pages runs every repository through Jekyll — a static site generator that deliberately ignores files and folders whose names begin with an underscore (_). This would silently drop asset directories named _assets or similar, breaking the page. Placing an empty .nojekyll file at the root of the published branch tells GitHub Pages to skip Jekyll processing entirely and serve files exactly as they appear in the repository. The file has no contents — its presence alone is the signal. 
# Verify the file exists in your build output
ls -la dist/.nojekyll
If you ever delete it by accident, recreate it with: 
touch dist/.nojekyll

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Static HTML shell routing strategy

GitHub Pages is a static file host. It has no awareness of React Router, so a visitor navigating directly to a client-side route — for example by typing https://[username].github.io/press-start/pages/About.html into the address bar or sharing a link — would normally receive a 404 error because there is no server to rewrite the URL to index.html. Press Start solves this without any server configuration. Each route has a corresponding HTML shell file under pages/. When the browser loads one of these files, a small inline bootstrap script immediately sets the browser’s URL hash to the correct route path and stores the intended route in window.__STATIC_PAGE_ROUTE__. The main React bundle then reads window.location.hash on mount and renders the matching page component. The full set of route shells is:
FileRoute rendered
pages/About.html/about — biography and background
pages/Projects.html/projects — project showcase
pages/Skills.html/skills — technology skill set
pages/Writing.html/writing — articles and posts
pages/CaseStudies.html/case-studies — in-depth case studies
pages/Contact.html/contact — contact form
The bootstrap script embedded in each shell follows this pattern, shown here for pages/About.html: 
<script>
  window.__STATIC_PAGE_ROUTE__ = "/about";
  if (!window.location.hash || window.location.hash === "#/" || window.location.hash === "#") {
    window.location.hash = "/about";
  }
</script>
After the hash is set, the same assets/main.js bundle that powers the root index.html is loaded as an ES module. React mounts into <div id="root">, React Router reads the hash, and the correct view renders — all without a server redirect.

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Custom domain

To serve Press Start from your own domain (for example portfolio.yourname.dev), add a CNAME file to the root of your published branch containing just the domain name: 
portfolio.yourname.dev
Create it alongside the build output: 
echo "portfolio.yourname.dev" > dist/CNAME
Then add a CNAME DNS record at your domain registrar pointing to [username].github.io. GitHub Pages detects the CNAME file automatically and provisions an HTTPS certificate via Let’s Encrypt within a few minutes.
If you rename or add routes in your React Router configuration, you must create a matching HTML shell in the pages/ directory for each new route. Without a corresponding shell, direct navigation to that URL will return a 404 on GitHub Pages. Copy an existing shell (for example pages/About.html), update the <title>, and change the window.__STATIC_PAGE_ROUTE__ value and hash assignment to match your new route path.
The current repository already contains a pre-built assets/ directory committed at the repo root. If you are deploying the repository as-is without any code changes, you can configure GitHub Pages to serve directly from the main branch root and skip running npm run build entirely. The committed build artefacts are production-ready.

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