CLAUDE.md

This file provides guidance to Claude Code (claude.ai/code) when working with code in this repository.

What this repository is

A personal academic website for Davood Damircheli (LSU), built with Jekyll 4.3 on a vendored copy of the Minimal Mistakes theme (v4.26.2). The theme’s source (_layouts, _includes, _sass, assets/js) lives directly in the repo rather than being pulled from the gem, so theme internals can be edited in place — but see “What to edit vs. leave alone” below.

Commands

bundle install                 # install Ruby gem dependencies (first run)
bundle exec jekyll serve       # local dev server with live reload at http://localhost:4000
bundle exec jekyll build       # build the static site into _site/
bundle exec jekyll serve --drafts   # include draft posts while previewing

Note: _config.yml is NOT reloaded by jekyll serve — restart the server after editing it. Gemfile.lock is gitignored but committed-adjacent; run bundle install if gems are missing.

Content architecture

This site diverges from a stock Minimal Mistakes install: instead of using _pages/, each top-level nav section is its own directory whose main page (index.md, or research.md/personal.md) sets the section URL — some via an explicit permalink, others (teaching/, cv/) via Jekyll’s default directory-based path. The nav bar is wired up in _data/navigation.yml, and each URL there must match a page’s resolved URL:

Directory	Page	`permalink`
`Home/`	`index.md`	`/Home/`
`research/`	`research.md`	`/research/`
`teaching/`	`index.md`	`/teaching/`
`besides/`	`personal.md`	`/besides/`
`cv/`	`index.md`	`/cv/`

Blog posts go in _posts/ as YYYY-MM-DD-title.md with YAML front matter (title, date, layout: single, optional categories/tags). Post images live in _posts/img/. Permalink pattern is /:categories/:title/ (set in _config.yml), and the home page paginates posts 5 at a time.
Site-wide assets: user content images in assets/img/, videos in assets/videos/, plus the theme’s assets/css and assets/js. The author avatar and bio are configured under author: in _config.yml.
content/ holds downloadable files (e.g. the CV PDF). draft/ and Home/ are content, not Jekyll’s _drafts.

Pages use theme layouts referenced by layout: in front matter — commonly single, archive, or splash. Available layouts are in _layouts/.

What to edit vs. leave alone

Edit for site content/config: the top-level content directories above, _posts/, _data/navigation.yml, _config.yml (site title, author, nav, plugins), and assets/img/assets/videos.
Theme internals (_layouts/, _includes/, _sass/, assets/js/_main.js): only touch when intentionally customizing the theme’s appearance/behavior. These are upstream theme files.
Ignore / do not treat as site content: docs/ and test/ are the upstream Minimal Mistakes demo site and test suite — both are excluded from the build via _config.yml and are not part of this website. CHANGELOG.md, Rakefile, README.md, and package.json are upstream theme-maintenance files, not site files.

Config notes

Plugins in use (_config.yml → plugins): jekyll-paginate, jekyll-sitemap, jekyll-gist, jekyll-feed, jekyll-include-cache. The jekyll-include-cache plugin is required — removing it causes Unknown tag 'include_cached' build errors.
Markdown is kramdown with GFM input; syntax highlighting via rouge.
Skin is set with minimal_mistakes_skin in _config.yml (default, air, dark, etc.).