Computational Astrophysics Lab (CALab) Website

Welcome to the official repository for the Computational Astrophysics Lab (CALab) website. This site is built with Jekyll and Bootstrap 5, hosted on GitHub Pages.

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📑 Table of Contents

1. Quick Maintenance (GitHub Web Interface)
   • Update Members
   • Add/Update Research Projects
   • Manage Highlights & News
   • Update Courses & Useful Links
2. Publications Management (Automatic)
3. Website Architecture
4. Developer Environment & Setup
5. Site Standards & Guidelines

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1. Quick Maintenance (GitHub Web Interface)

You can maintain most of the website's content without any coding knowledge by using the GitHub "Edit" (pencil icon) button.

👥 Update Members

Member information is stored in _data/members.yml.

1. Navigate to _data/members.yml.
2. Click the pencil icon to edit.
3. Add a member: Copy below block and update the details (name, role, position, image path, etc.).

   - english_name: "Firstname Lastname"
     native_name: "姓名"
     role: "postdoc"                  # Use roles from _data/member_roles.yml
     status: "current"                # Choose between "current" and "previous"
     image: "/assets/img/member/name.webp"
     website: "https://..."
     email: "user@example.com"
     github: "username"
     begin: 2020
     end: 2025                        # Only for previous members
      bio:
       - "Research interest line 1"
       - "Line 2"
     aliases: ["Lastname, F.", "Firstname L."] # Used to bold name in Publications

4. Alumni/Previous Members: Simply change status to previous. They will automatically move to the "Previous Members" page.
5. Images: Upload square (1:1) WebP images to assets/img/member/.

🚀 Add/Update Research Projects

Projects are individual Markdown files in _projects/.

1. Types of Projects:
   • Archive Projects: Standard research updates. Use tags like FDM, GAMER_app, or GAMER_dev.
   • Main Topic Projects: These appear on the "Research" landing page. They MUST have tags: ["main"] and a modal_id.
2. Add New: Create a file like _projects/2026-new-study.md.
3. Template:

   ---
   title: "Study Title"
   date: 2026-02-11
   tags: ["FDM"]             # Categorizes the project
   image: "/assets/img/..."  # Thumbnail image
   link: "https://doi.org/." # External paper link
   link_text: "Journal Ref"  # Text for the link button
   ---
   Executive summary of the project...

🏆 Manage Highlights & News

The special "Highlights" on the News and Research Archive pages are controlled by _data/research_section.yml.

• Add the filename (slug) of a project to the corresponding list:

  research_highlights:
    - project-slug-1
    - project-slug-2
  fdm_highlights:
    - project-slug-3
    - project-slug-4

📚 Update Courses & Useful Links

• Courses: Managed in _courses/. Edit the Markdown files to update syllabus or links.
• Useful Links: Managed in _useful/. Add new links or categories by editing the files there.

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2. Publications Management (Automatic)

We use an automated pipeline to handle publications. Do not edit _data/publications.yml directly!

1. Step: Edit _tools/export-bibtex.bib and add your BibTeX entries.
2. Automation: A GitHub Action automatically runs _tools/bib_to_yml.py to:
   • Convert BibTeX to YAML.
   • Match authors against our member list (and bold them).
   • Convert LaTeX journal macros (e.g., \apj) to full names.
   • Preserve Tags: If you manually add tags: ["FDM"] to an entry in _data/publications.yml, the script will remember it even when the bib is updated (as long as the title stays the same).

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3. Website Architecture

Folder/File	Purpose
_data/	YAML files for Members, Publications, and Navigation.
_projects/	The core collection of research updates.
_courses/	Course materials and syllabus.
_useful/	Curated links for lab members.
_includes/	Reusable components (Navbar, Cards, Modals).
_layouts/	Page templates (Default).
_sass/	Custom styling and Bootstrap overrides.
_tools/	Tools for automatic updates.
assets/	Static assets: img/, video/, js/, css/.
research/	Page for research projects. (Entrance from research pages' modal)
_config.yml	Configuration file for Jekyll.
Gemfile	Gemfile for Jekyll.

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4. Developer Environment & Setup

Requirements

• Ruby 3.0+ & Bundler
• Python 3.9+ (for publication script)

Local Launch

1. bundle install
2. bundle exec jekyll serve --baseurl ""
3. Open http://127.0.0.1:4000/

Deployment

Deployment is automatic! Any push to the main branch triggers:

1. Publication script conversion.
2. Jekyll build.
3. GitHub Pages deployment.

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5. Site Standards & Guidelines

🖼️ Media

• Format: Use WebP for images and WebM for videos whenever possible for better performance.
• Size: Member photos should be square (e.g., 400x400px).
• Video: Laboratory/Background videos should be muted and under 10MB.

🏷️ Naming

• Files: Use kebab-case (e.g., my-new-paper.md).
• Tags: Stick to consistent tags: FDM, GAMER_app, GAMER_dev, main.

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Maintained by: CALab Team Last Updated: February 2026