TL;DR
Jeff Geerling moved his long-running personal site off Drupal and rebuilt it using the Hugo static site generator to simplify publishing and reduce maintenance. Comments are disabled temporarily while a self-hosted static commenting solution is planned, and some images or URLs may be broken during the migration.
What happened
JeffGeerling.com, which had been powered by Drupal since 2009 and carried through versions 6, 7, 8, 9, and 10, was migrated to Hugo in early January 2026. The change follows years of maintaining a full-featured, enterprise-style DXP for a one-person blog and frustration with repetitive upgrade and module-management work—particularly the difficult Drupal 7 to 8 upgrade. Geerling said he already writes posts in Markdown and has experience moving hobby sites to static hosting with Jekyll and Hugo, preferring Hugo for sites he runs on his own infrastructure. The migration was tracked publicly on GitHub, and he warns readers to expect some broken image links and URL issues while redirects are added. Site comments are turned off initially and will be ported in a second phase. Search functionality also needs a replacement after he sunset his Apache Solr instance previously used for integrated search.
Why it matters
- Shows a shift from heavyweight CMS platforms to static site generators for personal projects where full DXP features are unnecessary.
- Highlights the productivity gains when a publishing workflow uses native Markdown and simple build/push commands.
- Signals that maintaining complex CMS infrastructures can consume time that creators prefer to spend on content.
- Demonstrates practical trade-offs: lower hosting/maintenance overhead versus temporary loss of integrated features (comments, search).
Key facts
- The site ran on Drupal starting in 2009 and was upgraded through Drupal 6, 7, 8, 9, and 10 over the years.
- JeffGeerling.com migration to Hugo was announced on Jan 3, 2026.
- The blog contains around 3,500+ posts and roughly 20 years of accumulated content.
- Geerling has been authoring posts in Markdown since 2020 and previously drafted in Markdown before converting to HTML.
- He uses Hugo because it is simpler to set up and faster for sites he hosts on his own infrastructure compared with Jekyll (which he uses for GitHub Pages projects).
- A public GitHub issue has been used to track the migration work; some images and old URLs may be broken and redirects are being added where possible.
- Comments are disabled site-wide initially and will be migrated in a planned 'phase two' effort.
- Previously integrated site search relied on an Apache Solr instance that Geerling has since sunset and needs to replace for Hugo.
What to watch next
- Timing and status of the comments migration (phase two) — currently disabled site-wide.
- How search is implemented on the Hugo site (not confirmed in the source).
- Progress on fixing broken images and adding redirects to preserve old URLs.
Quick glossary
- Hugo: A static site generator written in Go that builds websites from templates and Markdown files into static HTML.
- Drupal: A modular, database-backed content management system used to build dynamic websites and web applications.
- Static Site Generator (SSG): A tool that generates static HTML files from source content (often Markdown) and templates, removing the need for server-side rendering.
- Markdown: A lightweight markup language for formatting text that can be converted into HTML or other formats.
- Apache Solr: An open-source search platform used to index and query site content for search functionality.
Reader FAQ
Why did Jeff Geerling move the site from Drupal to Hugo?
He wanted a simpler, lower-maintenance publishing workflow that works natively with Markdown and avoids ongoing Drupal module and platform maintenance.
Are comments available on the new Hugo site?
Comments are disabled initially; Geerling is migrating them as a separate 'phase two' task.
Will old URLs and images still work?
He is attempting to keep content locations or add redirects, but warns that some images and URLs may be broken during the migration.
What search solution will the site use under Hugo?
not confirmed in the source
JeffGeerling.com has been Migrated to Hugo Jan 3, 2026 Since 2009, this website has run on Drupal. Starting with Drupal 6, and progressing through major site upgrades and migrations to…
Sources
- Jeffgeerling.com has been migrated to Hugo
- Jeffgeerling.com has been Migrated to Hugo
- Migrate to Hugo · Issue #158 · geerlingguy/jeffgeerling-com
- Drupal
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