Without a doubt, a free WordPress site is the easiest and fastest way to get started on the web. As a professional, I like control over every aspect of the website so I do not want ads particularly when I have no control over what ads will be plastered all over my site. I also want to use custom html which costs a fortune on a paid WordPress subscription. This brings me to static websites which can be hosted for free on various platforms such as GitHub.
I like Hugo because it renders sites quickly and is relatively easy to set up. The official Quick Start is very good but I have modified it to document my preferences. I prefer to run everything on Ubuntu or using Ubuntu under the Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) on Windows.
Download the hugo extended version as hugo_extended_X.XX.X_Linux-64bit.deb and create a new website called “mysite” with the Academic theme.
sudo gdebi install hugo_extended*
hugo new site mysite
cd mysite
git init
cd themes
git submodule add https://github.com/gcushen/hugo-academic.git
cd ~/mysite
echo 'theme = "hugo-academic"' >> config.tomlThe Academic theme contains an example site located in themes/hugo-academic/exampleSite. I also recommend editing the site footer located in themes/hugo-academic/layouts/partials/site_footer.html
Hugo builds sites into the public folder using the command hugo. IT can also build a locally hosted version of the site using hugo server.
You can check out my Hugo website using the Academic theme here.
Stephen Rush 