OwainJones.dev

New Giscus powered comments and H5YR widget!

4th July, 2026

Owain Jones

I've added a giscus powered comments, and the awesome H5YR widget, to my blog posts!

One of the things I've wanted to improve on my blog for a while is making it feel a little more interactive. Reading analytics is vaguely useful, but it's always better to hear directly from people who have read an article, whether that's feedback, questions, or simply letting me know they found something useful.

One of the reasons these features finally made it onto my blog is thanks to my friend James. He recently wrote about adding the H5YR widget to his own site, and it reminded me that I've been meaning to make my blog a little more interactive for quite some time. Seeing it in action gave me the nudge I needed to stop procrastinating and bloody well get it done!

So this weekend I finally got around to adding two new features to the site:

  • 💬 Giscus for comments

  • 🙌 H5YR for quick appreciation

Screenshot of a blog post footer in dark mode showing social sharing buttons, a Giscus-powered comments section with a comment and nested reply, and a sidebar displaying the H5YR ("High Five Your Review") widget with a "Give a #H5YR!" button. The page also includes a "Connect with me" section at the bottom featuring community and certification logos.

The new Giscus-powered comments section sits alongside the H5YR appreciation widget.

What is Giscus?

I've always liked the idea of comments on technical blogs, but I didn't particularly want to maintain yet another database, user accounts, spam filtering, or moderation system.

Giscus uses GitHub Discussions as the backend for comments. Visitors authenticate using GitHub, and every comment becomes part of a discussion in the associated repository. (Here's the repo powering the comments on here: https://github.com/OwainJ/owainjones.dev.comments/discussions)

That gives me several advantages:

  • No comment database to host or maintain.

  • GitHub authentication will hopefully reduce spam.

  • Discussions are easy for me to moderate.

  • Most people reading my blog are developers, and likely already have a GitHub account.

You can read more about Giscus here: giscus.app

What is H5YR?

Not everyone wants to leave a comment. Sometimes you've read an article, found it useful, and simply want to say "Thanks!"

The widget allows readers to give a virtual high five with a single click. It's a simple, lightweight way of showing appreciation without needing to write anything.

I really like the idea because it lowers the barrier to engagement. A lot of people consume technical content quietly, so having a quick way to acknowledge an article is a nice addition.

A massive shoutout to Owain Williams for leading the H5YR project!

You can read more about H5YR here: h5yr.com

What's Next?

I'll be keeping an eye on how people use both widgets over the coming weeks.

If you spot any issues or have suggestions for improvements, feel free to leave a comment below, or if you just enjoyed the article, give it a quick 🙌 H5YR!

So go on, give them a try below, and let me know what you think!