Setting up a personal academic homepage

There are virtually unlimited options available for building a personal homepage. One can find several options based on the purpose, aesthetics, technologies and difficulty.

Some of the easiest options include Google Sites, WordPress etc. If one wants to have a bit more control and customizability, there are static site builders like Hugo, Jekyll, Gatsby, etc. which can be hosted on GitHub Pages, Netlify etc. For an academic portfolio, I found “Hugo Academic” to be perfect, both aesthetically and feature-wise.

“Hugo Academic” comes with an easy deployment option to Netlify, which doesn’t require the user to write any code. To deploy it to GitHub is not as straightforward and too many guides for too many versions might confuse a novice user. Here, I am listing down the steps I followed to setup this website.

Get Started using GitHub Template

• Install Hugo
• Go to “Hugo Academic” Starter Template
• Click on Use this template to create a repository www (you may choose a different name)
• Clone your repository locally git clone git@github.com:<your-username>/www.git www
• cd www
• git submodule update --init --recursive
• Create an empty repository <your-username>.github.io on GitHub, if you haven’t already.
  • Note: If you do not have GitHub premium, this must be a public repository in order to use GitHub Pages
  • Set-up the GitHub Pages from repository settings.
• Add the website repository as a submodule, git submodule add -f -b master git@github.com:<your-username>/<your-username>.github.io.git public
• Edit content in the content directory
• Test locally, hugo server
• Generate public pages, hugo. This will generate the static website in the public/ directory.
• Commit content to the submodule (website repository) first, cd public, git add . and git commit -m "Website"
• Commit content to the base repository, git add . and git commit -m "Content"

Reference

Documentation: https://wowchemy.com/docs/

Following are the contents of the sample post that come with the installation. I am keeping them here since they contain useful and detailed instructions.

Original Instructions

Overview

1. The Wowchemy website builder for Hugo, along with its starter templates, is designed for professional creators, educators, and teams/organizations - although it can be used to create any kind of site
2. The template can be modified and customised to suit your needs. It’s a good platform for anyone looking to take control of their data and online identity whilst having the convenience to start off with a no-code solution (write in Markdown and customize with YAML parameters) and having flexibility to later add even deeper personalization with HTML and CSS
3. You can work with all your favourite tools and apps with hundreds of plugins and integrations to speed up your workflows, interact with your readers, and much more

Get Started

• Create a new site
• Personalize your site
• Chat with the Wowchemy community or Hugo community
• Twitter: @wowchemy @GeorgeCushen #MadeWithWowchemy
• Request a feature or report a bug for Wowchemy
• Updating Wowchemy? View the Update Guide and Release Notes

Crowd-funded open-source software

To help us develop this template and software sustainably under the MIT license, we ask all individuals and businesses that use it to help support its ongoing maintenance and development via sponsorship.

Click here to become a sponsor and help support Wowchemy’s future

As a token of appreciation for sponsoring, you can unlock these awesome rewards and extra features

Ecosystem

• Hugo Academic CLI: Automatically import publications from BibTeX

Inspiration

Check out the latest demo of what you’ll get in less than 10 minutes, or view the showcase of personal, project, and business sites.

Features

• Page builder - Create anything with widgets and elements
• Edit any type of content - Blog posts, publications, talks, slides, projects, and more!
• Create content in Markdown, Jupyter, or RStudio
• Plugin System - Fully customizable color and font themes
• Display Code and Math - Code highlighting and LaTeX math supported
• Integrations - Google Analytics, Disqus commenting, Maps, Contact Forms, and more!
• Beautiful Site - Simple and refreshing one page design
• Industry-Leading SEO - Help get your website found on search engines and social media
• Media Galleries - Display your images and videos with captions in a customizable gallery
• Mobile Friendly - Look amazing on every screen with a mobile friendly version of your site
• Multi-language - 34+ language packs including English, 中文, and Português
• Multi-user - Each author gets their own profile page
• Privacy Pack - Assists with GDPR
• Stand Out - Bring your site to life with animation, parallax backgrounds, and scroll effects
• One-Click Deployment - No servers. No databases. Only files.

Themes

Wowchemy and its templates come with automatic day (light) and night (dark) mode built-in. Alternatively, visitors can choose their preferred mode - click the moon icon in the top right of the Demo to see it in action! Day/night mode can also be disabled by the site admin in params.toml.

Choose a stunning theme and font for your site. Themes are fully customizable.

License

Copyright 2016-present George Cushen.

Released under the MIT license.