I’ve neglected a WordPress blog for the past 7 years or so. That blog was decommissioned today. I’ve migrated to a static site using Hugo. The set up has taken a little while, but I now have the ability to whip up posts in Markdown and deploy to Netlify straight from my GitHub.
The steps involved:
- export markdown from WordPress (I used exitwp-for-hugo; other options here)
- install hugo (I used snap on Ubuntu)
- choose a theme (I settled on Charaka)
- fork and fiddle endlessly with said theme (meet Chaka)
- publish to Netlify (super simple; this guide covers it)
I decided to migrate to a static site for a number of reasons:
- more familiar workflow (i.e. markdown/git)
- ease of publishing/desire to write more
- simplicity
This exercise was a lot of fun. It took way longer than it should have as I just couldn’t find a simple theme that I liked. Charaka was 70% there, and with my fork, Chaka, I’ve added a few tweaks, such as the ability to hide pages from search engine indexing and not to show up on the front page. I could still spend hours changing things, but migrating from WordPress was intended to ease the process of writing; tweaking my theme until it’s perfect is just further distraction (at least for the time being).
The migration and publishing processes are pretty straightforward. I’ve learnt a few bits and pieces about Hugo, and am now in a position where I can write more easily. Watch this space!