So I am looking at creating a wiki for a project akin to sites like Wikimon and Fire Emblem Wiki. I was told to try looking into Hugo and I’m just wondering if Hugo will be a good fit for creating such a site, as I don’t really want to put hours into learning something that’s not good for how I want to use it.
My site will be using Github Pages to host it.
Hugo is not a wiki. A wiki requires dynamic components on the server so you can edit pages. Hugo does not provide any dynamic components on the server.
Try DokuWiki instead.
Ah, that’s true. Though, in this specific case, it’s a purely personal project, and so I’d be the only one editing the site.
That’s not a wiki, that’s a website. For websites, Hugo is fine.
Okay, let me reword my question quickly.
I am looking at creating a site with info about a fangame and its world, and wish for it to be in the style of the above examples, in regards to things like page layout and traversing between pages. I am the only person working on this site, and an looking at using GitHub Pages to host it. Will Hogu be good for achieving this?
In theory, it would be possible to get a similar layout with Hugo. Given that both of your examples seem to be MediaWiki sites, however, you’ll get the layout at zero cost. (Disable user registration, done.)
It would take you more than just hours to get a remotely similar layout in Hugo.
Sorry, I don’t fully understand. Is that good or bad?
Depends. I, personally, recommend an actual wiki for what you want to achieve.
I would recommend and to take a breath.
Get an understanding what wiki is compared to static web site generation
What are your actual requirements?
What functionality do you need.
How do you want to edit?
Do you need a search.
Comment sytem?
…
Maybe there already is a hugo theme outside that fits your functional requirements…linking, search, dark mode, menus and linking.
Creating complex layouts will in both systems require deeper learning…
Define a basic starter and maybe check out how far you can get with either of the technologies.
Start simple and evolve
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This is an interesting question, if we can first agree on what a wiki is.
Site categories
For me, there are 3 (+1) main categories of sites:
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Hierarchical, with a tree structure. A given page has a mother page, sister pages and possibly daughter pages. Navigation is generally via a menu, either contextual or global (megamenu).
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Chronological, such as blogs and news sites. Temporality defines things. There’s a page before and a page after. Navigation is via chronological lists (home, dedicated pages, even taxonomy).
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Wiki. This is a web of links, with no precise organization. Navigation is almost entirely via links within the content. A menu is not necessary. For me, this is the definition of a wiki; questions of collaboration, revision, etc. are secondary.
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Everything else: search engines, mapping, social networks, sales sites with faceted navigation, etc.
Well-classified pages
In fact, a page is well classified:
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In a tree site, if it’s on the right branch, in the right place.
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In a blog, if it’s correctly dated, in the right category, the right tag, etc.
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In a wiki, if it makes the right contextual links and receives the right contextual links. So it’s not stored “in one place”, but linked “with the right things”.
Hugo as wiki
So, as far as I’m concerned, Hugo can be a wiki, as long as navigation is based on page content. {{< relref " " >}} is your friend.
It’s possible to classify them in directories or sections, like namespaces.
Useful (or necessary) functions
Now we need to ask what is desirable, useful, necessary (or to be avoided).
The collaborative aspect of work can be done via GitHub (or other such service), as can page history. Or collaboration isn’t necessary; there are personal wikis (VimWiki, TiddlyWiki) like @SpookySquid14 one.
Comments, if necessary, can be made via Disqus or another service.
Search using PageFind, another JS library or a search engine. Etc.
A much underestimated wiki function is the creation of links without a target page. The context and content require other content, the link is already made, but the target doesn’t yet exist. Cf. red vs green links here: wiki:syntax [DokuWiki]
Having used DokuWiki extensively (https://www.wikimatrix.org/consultants/dokuwiki/#c307), I can’t recommend it enough for this… wiki use. But it’s absolutely necessary to think first about what’s useful, desirable, necessary, etc. to know whether Hugo can be a solution.
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Wikipedia: “A wiki is a form of hypertext publication on the internet which is collaboratively edited and managed by its audience directly through a web browser.”
(Bold formatting added by me.)
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So Hugo can be a wiki: edit in GitHub (web) and deploy via GitHub Actions…