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Some things to know about Jekyll's file structure in Shopify

Sam Nguyen
Sam Updated: February 21, 2024

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If the site developers want to have a flexible and customizable tool to build a website, Jekyll is the best choice. With the open-source, the Shopify store owners can use this effective generator static site without paying any cost. With Jekyll, the website content which can be built in Markdown or Textile and Liquid templates.

Moreover, Jekyll can provide the users an engine behind GitHub Pages. Furthermore, online traders can connect to cloud-based CMS software such as CloudCannon, Forestry, Netlify, and Siteleaf. Because of its flexibility, the users have different options to use Jekyll which can combine with front-end frameworks such as Bootstrap, Semantic UI or others.

Although there are millions, online sellers, using Jekyll, however, few of them understand the basic structure of Jekyll. In this tutorial Some things to know about Jekyll’s file structure, we will describe basic Jekyll’s structure including _config.yml, _drafts, _includes, _layouts, _posts, _data, _site, .jekyll-metadata, Other Files/Folders.

Some things to know about Jekyll’s file structure

_config.yml

This file _config.yml structure which is designed with 3 main purposes includes:

  • Setting multiple variables on the website
  • Configuring collections or take the configuration in default
  • Specifying runtime variables

_drafts

This _drafts file allows the users to work on unpublished blog posts before they are published. Therefore, the Shopify store owners can optimize their blogs quality before the visitors can approach.

_includes

With the _includes file, it is possible for the online sellers to duplicate different files on the site as a newsletter subscribe form.

_layouts

The _layouts templates of the header, footer and navigation in HTML.

_posts

The web developers can write blog posts in Markdown.

_data

There are some data files can be used such as YAML, JSON and CSV files.

_site

With the _site file, the users can use Jekyll to build their site with all its best functionalities.

.jekyll-metadata

The Shopify store owners can track the files and update them with the Jekyll.

Other Files/Folders

Other files such as CSS, JavaScript and image files with front matter are processed and output to _site on a build process. And if files without front matter are copied straight to _site.

Conclusion

We hope that after this article Some things to know about Jekyll’s file structure, the Shopify store owners can have the overview and basic concepts about Jekyll. Moreover, the site builders can discover more about building content with Jekyll with a chain of articles such as How to build Jekyll on your site, How to set up Jekyll on Mac OS X, How to set up Jekyll on Linux and How to set up Jekyll on Windows.


Sam Nguyen is the CEO and founder of Avada Commerce, an e-commerce solution provider headquartered in Singapore. He is an expert on the Shopify e-commerce platform for online stores and retail point-of-sale systems. Sam loves talking about e-commerce and he aims to help over a million online businesses grow and thrive.

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