Canvas
Canvas is an open source blog publishing platform. The software was originally created by Todd Austin but is now contributed to by a group of freelance coders. More information about Austin and his developments can be found on his blog, which is also a demonstration of the Canvas software in action. Canvas is a direct competitor to WordPress, and the developer even throws a few punches, claiming that his software can create beautiful blogs without the need for "67 plugins," as advanced WordPress functionality is traditionally heavily dependent on third-party add-ons that can cause a clunky experience. Austin specifically names WordPress, Tumblr and Medium as falling short when it comes to making a blogging experience simple out of the box.
- Create simple and elegant blogs without the need for cumbersome setup
- The software's blog post editing environment is markdown based, and a side-by-side comparison shows exactly how the post will look when its published
- Uses the VueJS media library for easy organizing and uploading of files.
- The functionality is similar to DropBox
- Reader comments are supported by Disqus
- Native support for Google Analytics, which is installed by making a few clicks
- The product is completely free, but users can choose to support the software with a monthly pledge on Patreon
- Updates have recently been scarce, as the author has run into employment problems and lacks the time to maintain Canvas. The last minor update to Canvas was in August, 2017.
- Installation is only supported on Linux servers
The humble blog is one of the oldest and most reliable forms on online journalism. In its wake are the many platforms dedicated to creating them: Live Journal, eBlogger, Tumblr and of course WordPress, to name a few. But Todd Austin thought something was missing in this field, so he created Canvas, a simply-named app that aids in the creation of elegant blogs. Canvas aims to provide plenty of blogging features right after installation with no need to install cumbersome plugins. There's a minimal amount of configuration and plenty of customization, thanks to the open source code. A savvy user can simply fork the code on GitHub and make their own version of the software to suit their need.