The Stack is a Jekyll-powered blog and dataset repository for Daily Bruin's data journalism and newsroom technology projects.
What is The Stack?
The Stack is the official data journalism and newsroom tech blog of the Daily Bruin, UCLA's student newspaper. It runs on Jekyll, a static site generator, and its GitHub repository contains both the website source code and datasets used in published stories. The blog serves as a public archive of the team's methodology and code.
Key Features
- Jekyll-based static site — The entire blog is built with Jekyll, producing fast, static HTML pages that can be hosted on GitHub Pages or any static host.
- One-command setup — A setup.sh script handles dependency installation on Mac/Linux, and the site can be served locally with
jekyll serve. - Windows support — The repo includes explicit installation instructions for Windows users, including alternatives like using a VirtualBox VM running Ubuntu Server.
- Structured contribution workflow — Contributors develop on feature branches and only the data editor commits to master, keeping the main branch stable.
- Project reports — The repository hosts project reports in docs/project-reports/year, documenting tools and workflows for future reference.
- Brand guidelines — A link to the Stack's brand guidelines is provided for consistent visual identity across posts.
- GitHub integration — The project lives on GitHub, enabling issue tracking, pull requests, and version control for both content and code.
- Built-in troubleshooting — The README includes fixes for dependency errors, such as deleting the Gemfile.lock file.
Who is it for?
The Stack is designed for the Daily Bruin's data journalism team, including editors and reporters who produce data-driven stories. It also serves as a reference for student journalists and newsroom developers who want to see how a real newsroom publishes data journalism on Jekyll. Anyone looking to set up a similar blog can borrow the installation workflow and project report structure.
What can you do with The Stack?
- Data journalists at the Daily Bruin: publish interactive posts and link to datasets used in their investigations.
- Newsroom developers: collaborate on blog posts and code through the feature-branch workflow, keeping master stable.
- Student media organizations: use the repository as a template for launching their own Jekyll-based newsroom tech blog.
- Jekyll learners: follow the installation and troubleshooting steps to run a Jekyll site locally on Mac, Linux, or Windows.
How does The Stack work?
Setting up the blog locally starts by cloning the repository and running ./setup.sh on Mac/Linux. Windows users can follow the Jekyll on Windows guide or run a virtual machine. After setup, jekyll serve launches a local server at port 4000. Content is written as Markdown posts, and contributions are made via pull requests on feature branches.
