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---
post_date: 2026-06-30
description: How I mirror my Gemini capsule to the web without abandoning geminispace.
---
# Moving my weblog off Gemini (without leaving it)
*This is placeholder text laid out so you can see how a full post reads. Replace it with the real `.gmi` content when you export the capsule — the structure below covers everything a converted Gemini post will need: headings, lists, quotes, code, and links.*
I've kept a capsule at `gemini://gemini.ctrl-c.club/~tjp/` for a few years now. Gemini is a lovely place to write: the format is so constrained that there's nothing to fiddle with, and the whole thing rewards plain, linear prose. But I wanted a web presence too — one that fits in with the personal sites I keep finding in webrings.
## The plan
The goal was never to abandon geminispace. It was to have both, from one source of truth. Gemtext is close enough to Markdown that a small converter gets you most of the way there:
- Keep writing `.gmi` files in my capsule.
- Run a converter that emits HTML with the same structure.
- Wrap each page in the site template you're reading now.
## The converter
Gemtext has exactly one block-level construct per line, which makes parsing almost insultingly simple. Here's the core of it:
```sh
while IFS= read -r line; do
case "$line" in
"### "*) echo "<h3>${line#### }</h3>" ;;
"## "*) echo "<h2>${line### }</h2>" ;;
"# "*) echo "<h1>${line## }</h1>" ;;
"=> "*) emit_link "$line" ;;
"* "*) emit_list_item "$line" ;;
"> "*) echo "<blockquote>${line#> }</blockquote>" ;;
"") echo "" ;;
*) echo "<p>$line</p>" ;;
esac
done < "$1"
```
That's genuinely most of it. The fiddly parts are link lines (`=>` can be a bare URL or have link text) and collapsing runs of `* ` lines into a single `<ul>`.
> The best format is the one that outlives the tool you wrote it in. Gemtext will still be readable when this converter is long gone.
## What I kept
No client-side anything. The web version renders identically with JavaScript disabled, because there is no JavaScript to disable. Fonts are whatever your system already has. The whole page is a few kilobytes.
If you want the source, it lives with the rest of my [projects](../projects/index.html). And the capsule is still there — see the [colophon](../about/index.html) for how it all fits together.
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