As someone in the cybersecurity space, it shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone that writing and web design aren’t exactly my bread and butter. None of the forward-facing stuff comes to me naturally. I prefer to do my work behind the scenes. What follows is a brief recount of how I built my cybersecurity portfolio, despite the fact it was anything but straightforward and quick. With all that being said, I did start a bit ahead. I already had a GitHub profile and a built-out LinkedIn page to work with, so there was a reference for the other parts of the portfolio.

I began by securing my own web domain. I settled on something simple: gdrakecybersec.com. I went through Cloudflare to acquire the domain, and though that process should’ve been straightforward, I did accidentally purchase gdrakecybersecuritysec.com first. That wasn’t going to work; saying “cybersecurity sec” is like saying “ATM machine.” It’s redundant. So, I had to do this process twice. Off to a smooth start.

Next, I created an official email with this domain. I went through Gmail for ease of use. Though the process was relatively user-friendly, it did take Google several tries before it could verify the DNS information of my domain. But, with the groundwork done, I could get into the main portion of the setup.

I created a GitHub blog site to be the base of my portfolio. While not as user-friendly as a site like Squarespace, this option came with templates that worked perfectly for my needs. From there, I wrote out both an “About” page that includes a detailed introduction into me as a professional and contact information. Finally, I built out this blog page! In hindsight, I learned more about web hosting during this process than any other concept.