Getting started

This article helps you get started with the Mainroad theme, including installation and minimal configuration.

Welcome to the Mainroad theme documentation. This quick start guide covers Mainroad theme installation and minimal configuration and is intended for intermediate to advanced users. To understand this guide, you need to be familiar with the Hugo static site generator.

Installation

Before installing the Mainroad theme, make sure that you’ve installed Hugo (version 0.48 or later) and created a new site. To learn how to install Hugo, visit Hugo Documentation.

There are a few ways to install a theme in Hugo. This can be done via git submodule, git clone, Hugo modules, or by downloading the archive and manually copying the files. Three installation options are described below.

Option A: git submodule

Additional requirements: git

If you don’t plan to make significant changes to the theme but still want to track and update it, you can add it as a git submodule by running the following command from the root directory of your Hugo site:

git submodule add https://github.com/vimux/mainroad.git themes/mainroad

Note: Netlify expects git submodule instead of git clone.

Option B: git clone

Additional requirements: git

Run this git clone command from the root of your Hugo site:

git clone https://github.com/vimux/mainroad.git themes/mainroad

Option C: Manual install

If you do not want to use git, you can manually download ZIP and extract it into the themes/mainroad within your Hugo site.


Activate theme

Whichever installation option you choose, don’t forget to edit theme param of the site configuration config.toml:

theme = "mainroad"

To check it out, build the site via hugo command or make it available on a local server via hugo server.

Minimal configuration

Do not copy the example config as-is. Use only the parameters that you need. The Mainroad theme contains required defaults, so you don’t need to add all of the configuration parameters to run the theme for the first time. Before adding any theme-specific parameters, make sure to edit the theme param inside the config file and check that the theme works.

For information about common customization settings, see Customization page. To view our example configuration, visit demo config.

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