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Import Markdown files

Bring a folder of Markdown files, such as another static site's content or notes, into a Goodfellow site as pages and collections, with their links, pictures and front matter.

A folder of Markdown files, such as the content of a site made with Hugo, Jekyll, Eleventy, Astro or Docusaurus, or notes kept as .md files, can be brought into a Goodfellow site. You choose which folders become pages and which become collections, and see what will come across before anything changes.

In the admin panel

  1. Go to Site Settings → Import, and under Import Markdown files, choose the folder. Your browser may ask before letting the page read it.
  2. Choose how each folder comes across: Pages, the choice for the files at the top, or A collection, the choice for every other folder.
  3. Tick what else you'd like: replacing the home page with the top's index.md, replacing pages the site already has at the same addresses, importing drafts too, adding the top-level pages to the main menu, and keeping other front matter as fields.
  4. Check what will come across: the pages, each collection with its items' addresses, the redirects and the media, and anything that couldn't come across as it was.
  5. Click Import. Pictures are made ready as uploads are, then everything is published in one go. With drafts, everything goes into a draft instead, so nothing goes live until you publish it.

Pages

Each file in a folder imported as pages becomes a page of built-in blocks, as WordPress pages do: headings, paragraphs, lists, quotes, tables, code and pictures.

  • Addresses: about.md and about/index.md become /about, as do _index.md and README.md for their folder. A permalink or url in the front matter wins, and slug changes the last part.
  • The home page: the top's index.md replaces it only when you tick Replace the home page.
  • Pages the site has: a file at an address the site already has a page at is left out, unless you tick Replace pages. Version history keeps the old ones.
  • Settings: title (or the first heading, or the file's name), description, image and noindex become the page's settings.
  • The main menu: with Add the top-level pages to the main menu, they're added after what's there, in the order of their weight, order, nav_order or sidebar_position, and then by title.

Collections

Each folder imported as a collection becomes one, named after the folder, with its items at /<folder>/<name>, or where their permalink puts them, when every item's agrees. Items keep their Markdown as written, as Markdown items do.

  • Fields: title, date (or the date a Jekyll post's file name starts with), description or summary, image, categories and tags become fields, and the collection is sorted newest first where items have dates. Other front matter is left out, unless you tick Keep other front matter as fields, which keeps text and yes-or-no values.
  • The folder's own page: a folder's _index.md or index.md becomes a page at the collection's address that lists its items; without one, a page listing them is made, unless the site has a page there already.
  • Names: an item's name is its file's, without a date at its start, or its slug.
  • HTML in items' Markdown shows as text, as it does in every Markdown item, and the import lists the items that have some.
  • Links between the files get their new addresses, # parts included. Links to addresses the site already has stay; links to files or pages that aren't there become just their words, so nothing is broken, and the import lists where.
  • Pictures and files next to the Markdown, or under static/, public/ or assets/ for addresses starting with /, are copied into the media library, each once. Ones that aren't there are left out and listed.
  • Redirects: an address that changed, and every address in aliases or redirect_from, sends visitors to the new one. Files in folders starting with _, such as Jekyll's _posts, were never addresses of the old site, so they get none.
  • Drafts: files with draft: true or published: false are left out unless you tick Import drafts too.
  • Template code of another site, such as Hugo's shortcodes {{< … >}} or Liquid's {% … %}, shows as written, and the import lists the files that have some.

From the command line

npx goodfellow import markdown ../old-site/content

(npx goodfellow-next import markdown for a Next.js site.) The files at the top become pages and every folder a collection, unless --pages <folder> or --collection <folder> says otherwise, once for each folder, with . for the files at the top. --replace-home, --replace-pages, --drafts, --menu and --keep-fields do what the boxes in the admin panel do. --dry-run says what would come across and changes nothing. SVG pictures aren't copied, since only the admin panel can make them safe, nor are files over 25 MB.