Automate your github website using Travis

Now there are many many tutorials out there, honestly non of them worked for me. It all failed ; reasons below. This is an account of how I did it.

Requirements :

• You habe a github pages built using jekyll(or anything else)
• Your source code is on sources branch and you want built _site folder to be deployed on the master branch ; so that if anyone visits {yourname}.github.io , they see your site.
• I assume you use ` bundle exec jekyll build in your root project directory to build your site and you copy/push "just" the _site` folder to the repository to make the site live
• and you want to automate this process using travis…

What you want :

Everytime you push to github/sources branch, Travis will build the site and deploy only the _site folder to master or any other branch.

Image credits :https://savaslabs.com/2016/10/25/deploy-jekyll-with-travis.html

What to do :

There should be .travis.yml file in the sources/project directory so that it automatically triggers a build when you push it ; and deploys to the ` master` branch upon a successful build.

So , now go to https://travis-ci.org ; link your github account and turn on the repository containing your project files/where you want to deploy.

See the .travis.yml below.

Set Up GITHUB Token

get the GITHUB TOKEN from your github account > settings > development > tokens and save it in the ENV _VARIABLES of the dashboard of that repository.

Also MANDATORY

in the _config.yml of your jekyll site add the following line.

exclude:
  - vendor

this must be in your _config.yml file because travis installs the gems in the ./vendor/bundle folder.

else that would always break builds like this and your site wont be built properly.

the .travis.yml FILE

#This is travis script to auto build the site on  #source branch and deploy to mster branch
language: ruby

# add a ruby container
rvm:
  - 2.4.1
cache: bundler
  - 
#what should be done in the VM before install
before_install:
    - gem update --system
    - gem install bundler
    - 
#what to install and what script to run
#script contains : bundle install
#                  bundle exec jekyll build
script: ./CI/travis.sh


#this is to deploy from "sources" branch to "master" branch ; change on and target accordingly
deploy:
  provider: pages
  skip_cleanup: true
  github_token: $GITHUB_TOKEN  # Set in the settings page of your repository, as a secure variable
  keep_history: true
  on:
    branch: sources
  local_dir: _site
  target_branch: master

and traviscibot will deploy successfully.