Queen of San Diego — Tech Blog

Under the hood at queenofsandiego.com

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Building Auto-Generated Technical Blog Infrastructure for Four Domain Properties

This session implemented a comprehensive system for auto-generating granular technical documentation across four separate domain properties: queenofsandiego.com, sailjada.com, dangerouscentaur.com, and burialsatseasandiego.com. The goal was to create a transparent audit trail of all infrastructure and content changes, making it easy for stakeholders to understand exactly what work was performed.

What Was Done

Built a complete automated technical blogging pipeline that captures development session data and generates detailed posts in real-time:

  • Created infrastructure initialization script to provision S3 buckets, CloudFront distributions, and DNS records for four tech blog subdomains
  • Implemented Stop hook integration with Claude Code to automatically trigger blog post generation when development sessions end
  • Built Python blog generator that parses session transcripts and creates granular technical documentation
  • Added navigation links to "Ship's Papers" menus on each primary domain
  • Configured certificate validation and CloudFront caching for optimal delivery

Technical Architecture

Blog Infrastructure per Domain

Each domain received identical infrastructure patterns:

  • S3 Origin Buckets:
    • qos-tech-blog — queenofsandiego.com technical posts
    • jada-tech-blog — sailjada.com technical posts
    • dc-tech-blog — dangerouscentaur.com technical posts
    • bats-tech-blog — burialsatseasandiego.com technical posts
  • CloudFront Distributions: Each bucket fronted by a CloudFront distribution with cache behaviors configured for index.html default root object and gzip compression
  • DNS Configuration:
    • queenofsandiego.com & sailjada.com: Route53 CNAME records pointing to CloudFront distributions (using existing wildcard certificates)
    • dangerouscentaur.com: Namecheap CNAME to leverage existing wildcard CloudFront distribution (E2Q4UU71SRNTMB on dc-sites bucket)
    • burialsatseasandiego.com: GoDaddy DNS CNAME record with ACM certificate validation

Automation Pipeline

The blog generation system operates through these components:

  • Stop Hook Script: /Users/cb/.claude/hooks/tech_blog_stop.sh — executes when Claude Code sessions complete, extracting session transcript and invoking the blog generator
  • Infrastructure Init Script: /Users/cb/Documents/repos/tools/tech_blog_init.py — provisions all S3 buckets, CloudFront distributions, IAM policies, and DNS records; includes dry-run mode for validation
  • Blog Generator: /Users/cb/Documents/repos/tools/tech_blog_generator.py — parses JSONL-formatted session transcripts and generates HTML posts with granular details about files modified, commands executed, and infrastructure changes

Certificate and DNS Strategy

Leveraged existing AWS Certificate Manager wildcard certificates to minimize provisioning overhead:

  • *.queenofsandiego.com: Existing wildcard cert used for tech.queenofsandiego.com CloudFront distribution
  • *.sailjada.com: Existing wildcard cert used for tech.sailjada.com CloudFront distribution
  • dangerouscentaur.com: Reused existing wildcard CloudFront distribution (E2Q4UU71SRNTMB) originally serving dc-sites bucket, avoiding certificate provisioning entirely
  • burialsatseasandiego.com: Provisioned new ACM certificate with DNS validation; validation CNAME added to GoDaddy DNS via API integration

Session Transcript Data Format

Claude Code sessions are logged as JSONL files in ~/.claude/sessions/. Each line is a JSON object containing:

  • type: Message type (e.g., "tool_use", "text", "command")
  • tool_name: For tool_use entries (e.g., "write_file", "read_file")
  • path: File paths for file operations
  • output: Command output or tool results
  • arguments: Tool parameters

The blog generator parses this JSONL format to extract:

  • All files created/modified with relative paths
  • All shell commands executed (credentials redacted)
  • Infrastructure changes (S3, CloudFront, Route53, DNS operations)
  • Timestamps and sequence of operations

Integration with Ship's Papers Navigation

Updated /Users/cb/Documents/repos/sites/queenofsandiego.com/index.html to add a "Technical Blog" link in the Ship's Papers dropdown menu, pointing to https://tech.queenofsandiego.com/. Similar updates were made to the other domain sites. This provides stakeholders direct access to the technical documentation from the main navigation.

Key Decisions and Trade-offs

  • JSONL Session Format: Claude Code's native transcript format is JSONL for efficiency and streaming-friendly parsing, though it requires careful handling of nested JSON structures
  • Granular Post Generation: Posts capture individual file modifications, command outputs, and infrastructure changes rather than summarizing sessions, making the audit trail precise and actionable
  • Credential Redaction: The blog generator automatically filters sensitive data (API keys, passwords, tokens) from command outputs before publishing, using pattern-matching for common credential formats
  • CloudFront Reuse: For dangerouscentaur.com, reused the existing wildcard distribution to avoid ACM provisioning and certificate validation overhead
  • DNS Provider Flexibility: Each domain uses its native DNS provider (Route53 for AWS-hosted zones, Namecheap for dangerouscentaur, GoDaddy for burialsatseasandiego) rather than consolidating to a single provider, respecting existing domain registrations

Blog Post Structure

Generated posts follow a consistent HTML structure:

  • Header: Session date, duration, number of changes
  • Files Modified: Organized by file path with operation type (Write/Edit)
  • Commands Executed: Shell commands with outputs (sensitive data stripped)
  • Infrastructure Changes: AWS and DNS changes with resource names
  • Technical Notes: Decisions made and rationale

Infrastructure Validation

Tested the system end-to-end:

  • Dry-run initialization to verify all resource configurations without provisioning
  • Actual provisioning of S3 buckets with versioning and encryption enabled