AstroLog PIR®
All GitHub home & brand entries

Choose how you arrive: a welcome guide, one search for everything, and a preview card for every entry

MediumGitHub home & brand 2 min readBy Christopher W
TL;DR: PIR®'s GitHub hub and this AstroLog now greet first-time visitors with a short "Choose how you arrive" (light, motion, contrast and cursor effects), offer a welcome guide that explains what's here and where the community talks, and share one / search across both sites. Every entry and write-up also gets its own link-preview card, with a star of its own.
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🌌 Choose how you arrive

  • The first time you open the hub or the AstroLog, a small panel asks how you’d like the page: Night sky (PIR’s home look), Daybreak for bright rooms, or Follow the sky (Daybreak by day, night after seven).
  • Pick how much moves: Still, Drift (stars twinkle and part around your pointer), or Shooting stars (the odd meteor, and a comet tail behind your pointer). Cursor effects have their own on/off switch, and there’s a More contrast switch for easier reading.
  • If your device already asks for less motion or more contrast, those are chosen for you. Your choice is saved in your browser only. It follows you between the hub and the AstroLog, and A.L.E.X.’s desks pick up your light too.
  • Change any of it later from the Light & motion drawer in the header, or the quick buttons beside it.

🧭 A welcome guide

  • Open it from the drawer, by pressing ?, or with the Welcome guide link in the footer. Eight short steps light up the eight points of a star: what this site is, changelog versus library, search, light and motion, who’s doing the work, where the community talks (PIR’s Discord, with crisis resources right beside it), and the main site.
  • There’s a space for a few words of welcome from Kevin F. It stays empty on purpose until he writes them.

🔎 One search for everything

  • Press / (or ⌘ K) on any page of the hub or the AstroLog. It searches every entry, write-up, project, helpdesk and page on both sites, ranks matches as you type, and can change the light or motion for you.
  • Everything the old jump palette offered is still there, including A.L.E.X.’s /ask, /techcom, /litcom and /mod commands to copy.

🙋 Who’s doing the work

  • Every entry now credits who did it, by first name and last initial in keeping with PIR’s anonymity traditions, with a GitHub picture when there is one and a small night sky with initials when there isn’t.
  • The hub lists everyone, including trusted servants who haven’t made an entry yet, so you can see how this will look as more people pitch in.

✨ A preview card for every entry

  • Share a link to any entry or write-up in Discord, WhatsApp or iMessage and it arrives with its own card: the title, who made it, and a small constellation whose brightest star is that entry, in the same rose, gold or teal as its star on the chart.
  • The Copy a link button under each entry does the copying for you.