Getting started
SkyScribe Sites vs. SDK-driven websites
Once you have written something, you need a website to show it. There are two ways to get one, and they are not mutually exclusive.
The short version
- Want a good-looking blog live today, with zero code? → SkyScribe Site.
- Have a developer who can build a website, or one already? → an SDK-driven website (one a developer builds themselves with the SkyScribe SDK, not via the site design wizard). This route needs coding.
Side by side
| SkyScribe Site | SDK-driven website | |
|---|---|---|
| Who builds it | SkyScribe, via the design wizard | A developer, writing code |
| Code required | None | Yes. The SkyScribe SDK is a code library |
| Hosting | Included, run by SkyScribe | The developer's choice (Vercel, Cloudflare, a server…) |
| Address | your-name.skyscribe.site | Any domain you control |
| Cost | Needs an active PRO subscription, one Site Slot per site | The SDK is free and open source; you pay only for hosting |
| Design control | Wizard options: templates, colours, fonts, layout | Total. The developer writes the markup and CSS |
| Time to launch | Minutes | A development project |
| Content it shows | One Publication | One or many Publications |
They share the same content
A Publication is just content in your Bluesky account. Nothing about it is tied to how it is displayed. So the same Publication can:
- power a SkyScribe Site and an SDK-driven website at the same time (for example, a SkyScribe Site now and a bespoke website later, with no migration);
- power neither. Your writing still exists and is still yours.
Note
Switching later is not a data migration. You point the new website at the same Publication, and the old one keeps working until you turn it off.
Choosing
Pick a SkyScribe Site if you want to write, not build; you are happy
choosing from wizard options rather than designing from scratch; and a
skyscribe.site address is enough.
Pick an SDK-driven website if you (or someone you work with) write code; you want a design that is not a template; you are adding a blog to a website that already exists; or you want to host it yourself.
Next
- To set up a hosted site: SkyScribe Sites.
- To build an SDK-driven website: send your developer to the SkyScribe SDK docs. The quickstart gets a page showing your Publication in a few minutes.
- Either way, you will want Authoring for writing and organising the content itself.