Getting Started

Here’s how to start your new website. If you’re new to Hugo, we recommend learning more about it in its excellent starter’s guide.

Install Hugo

Download and install Hugo 0.126.0 or newer for your operating system following the instructions.

The standard edition of Hugo is sufficient but you can also use the extended edition.

Create your Project

Use Hugo’s new site command to make a new website

hugo new site my-new-site

Then move into the new directory

cd my-new-site

Run all future commands from this directory.

Install the Theme

Download as a Zip File

You can download the theme as a .zip file and unzip it into the themes/hugo-theme-relearn directory.

Then add this at the top of your hugo.toml

theme = 'hugo-theme-relearn'

theme: hugo-theme-relearn

{
   "theme": "hugo-theme-relearn"
}

Use Hugo’s Module System

Install the Relearn theme using Hugo’s module system

hugo mod init example.com

Then add this at the end of your hugo.toml

[module]
  [[module.imports]]
    path = 'github.com/McShelby/hugo-theme-relearn'

module:
  imports:
  - path: github.com/McShelby/hugo-theme-relearn

{
   "module": {
      "imports": [
         {
            "path": "github.com/McShelby/hugo-theme-relearn"
         }
      ]
   }
}

Use as a Git Submodule

If you’re using Git for your project, you can create a repository now

git init

Add the theme as a Git submodule

git submodule add --depth 1 https://github.com/McShelby/hugo-theme-relearn.git themes/hugo-theme-relearn

Then add this at the top of your hugo.toml

theme = 'hugo-theme-relearn'

theme: hugo-theme-relearn

{
   "theme": "hugo-theme-relearn"
}

Create your Home Page

Start by making a home page

hugo new --kind home _index.md

The new home page file content/_index.md has two parts: the page info (like title) at the top, called front matter, and the page content below.

Create your First Chapter Page

Chapters are top-level pages that contain other pages. They have a special layout.

Make your first chapter page

hugo new --kind chapter first-chapter/_index.md

The new file content/first-chapter/_index.md has a weight number in the front matter. This sets the chapter’s subtitle and its order in the menu.

Create your First Content Pages

Now make content pages inside the chapter. Here are three ways to do this

hugo new first-chapter/first-page/_index.md
hugo new first-chapter/second-page/index.md
hugo new first-chapter/third-page.md

Hugo treats these files differently based on their file names. Learn more in Hugo’s guide.

Feel free to edit these files. Change the title, add a weight if you want, and write your content.

Test your Website Locally

Start your new website on your computer with this command

hugo serve

Open http://localhost:1313 in your web browser.

You can keep the server running while you edit. The browser will update automatically when you save changes.

Build and Deploy your Website

When your site is ready to go live, run this command

hugo

This creates a public directory with all your website files.

You can upload this directory to any web server, or use one of Hugo’s many other ways to publish.

Next Steps

Your site is now fully functional.

You can continue configuring your site to your needs.

Or just start authoring content and discover what’s possible.