Questions[html](ubuntu)

I use the R Studio IDE to do many things, one of which is to serve local websites utilizing the blogdown package which is a fork of hugo. I write the code in R Studio and preview the site utilizing the blogdown::serve_site() command. This is the easiest way I know of previewing static HTML sites. Utilizing hugo R Studio coerces my browser to go to the 127.0.0.1:XXXX location and my local site is previewed before my eyes.

Can I serve local sites natively with Ubuntu 18.04? How? I imagine it should be very simple. Searching online I can't find any simple way to do it though. If I simply open the static HTML files directly in my browser they showup wonky. All image links are immediately broken. Formatting of headings, hyperlinks, etc is not the same as when I serve the page locally with hugo.

EDIT - I did not really define my term 'simplicity'. There are two different approaches (so far) in the answers, one that is simplest to the end user, and one that is simple with regard to operations being performed by my computer. I like both approaches and will welcome answers utilizing any approach as I test them. Thank you.

I want my default application to open .html files to be Chrome but on Ubuntu 18.04 every time I open vscode it overrides my set default. Not sure how to enable this permanently, does anyone know how to stop this change?

I'm creating a webpage right now and am wondering if it is possible to input a command in HTML that will open an installed Ubuntu app like Chromium, or a terminal window, or Nautilus.

Is something like this possible? Thanks!

I just discovered that zenity support html tags.

zenity --error --text "hello <b>world</b>"

but how to make it work with entry type ?

zenity --entry --text "hello <b>world</b>"

It's printing tags instead of interpreting them.

There are some sites that provide books as HTML pages (e.g., legal stuff).

What can I use to create a PDF book from these pages, based on the already-existing structure?

In Windows there is Adobe Professional (commercial software). I'm guessing that Linux has something free? A solution involving scripting would be OK for me.