--- title: Pardon my dust – re-homing 21 years of blog content of... description: Christian Heilmann is migrating his 21-year-old WordPress blog off WordPress and GoDaddy toward a static Jekyll site. The move was triggered by SSL certificate... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/pardon-my-dust-re-homing-21-years-of-blog-content-of-christianheilmann-com-7nrx787qx twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: Pardon my dust – re-homing 21 years of blog content of christianheilmann.com | daily.dev og:description: Christian Heilmann is migrating his 21-year-old WordPress blog off WordPress and GoDaddy toward a static Jekyll site. The move was triggered by SSL certificate... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/pardon-my-dust-re-homing-21-years-of-blog-content-of-christianheilmann-com-7nrx787qx og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/7Nrx787QX.png og:image:alt: Pardon my dust – re-homing 21 years of blog content of christianheilmann.com og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Pardon my dust – re-homing 21 years of blog content of christianheilmann.com **[Christian Heilmann](https://daily.dev/sources/christianheilmann)** · 4 min read · 3 upvotes · 1 comments ## Summary Christian Heilmann is migrating his 21-year-old WordPress blog off WordPress and GoDaddy toward a static Jekyll site. The move was triggered by SSL certificate costs and hassles after MediaTemple was bought by GoDaddy. He has converted 1850 blog posts to markdown so far, keeping the original folder structure to avoid breaking links. He used Simply Static to snapshot the site and plans to build his own search and feed generation, plus AI-generated summaries for old posts. He no longer uses WordPress features such as comments or the high fidelity editor. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Questions this post answers ### What tool can I use to take a static snapshot of a WordPress site before migrating off it? Simply Static is a WordPress plugin that generates a static snapshot of a WordPress site, which can then be used as the basis for migrating to a different platform or host. It was used as the first step in converting a 21-year-old WordPress blog with 1850 posts into markdown files for a Jekyll-based static site, while preserving the original folder structure to avoid breaking existing links. _Developers planning a WordPress-to-static migration can compare real-world approaches like this one on daily.dev._ ### Why would someone move a WordPress blog to Jekyll instead of staying on WordPress? A blogger moved off WordPress because he no longer used its core functionality, having disabled comments due to spam, never used the rich text editor (only the classic text box), and avoided social media plugins. Combined with rising SSL certificate costs after GoDaddy acquired MediaTemple, this made a leaner static Jekyll site maintained via Git(Hub) and VS Code a better fit. _Weighing WordPress against a static generator for your own site? Track these migration trade-offs on daily.dev._ ## Community discussion Top comments from developers on daily.dev. **@coppnic** · 0 upvotes > Oh that brings me back from when I stopped using WP and started using Jekyll. It's really "easy" to move and even more relaxing to use. It pushes the focus back to actual writing. Loving it. Nice article as well! ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [JeffGeerling.com has been Migrated to Hugo](https://daily.dev/posts/jeffgeerling-com-has-been-migrated-to-hugo-owf18dark) · Jeff Geerling · 4 upvotes · 0 comments - [Goodbye WordPress](https://daily.dev/posts/goodbye-wordpress-y1ica44vn) · Read the Tea Leaves · 53 upvotes · 11 comments - [Migrating from Statamic to Eleventy. This site’s had major surgery](https://daily.dev/posts/migrating-from-statamic-to-eleventy-this-site-s-had-major-surgery-zw48ycgv8) · Blogging and all that Malarkey · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [Finally, the Rails Blog Runs on Rails](https://daily.dev/posts/finally-the-rails-blog-runs-on-rails-1rapetyso) · RUBYLAND · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [Rewrote my blog with Zine](https://daily.dev/posts/rewrote-my-blog-with-zine-yjxkpmvtc) · Drew DeVault · 1 upvotes · 0 comments --- Tags: [#webdev](https://daily.dev/tags/webdev), [#github](https://daily.dev/tags/github), [#wordpress](https://daily.dev/tags/wordpress) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/pardon-my-dust-re-homing-21-years-of-blog-content-of-christianheilmann-com-7nrx787qx) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"Pardon my dust – re-homing 21 years of blog content of christianheilmann.com","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/pardon-my-dust-re-homing-21-years-of-blog-content-of-christianheilmann-com-7nrx787qx","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/pardon-my-dust-re-homing-21-years-of-blog-content-of-christianheilmann-com-7nrx787qx"},"datePublished":"2026-10-28T05:24:50.251Z","dateModified":"2026-10-28T05:46:13.557Z","description":"Christian Heilmann is migrating his 21-year-old WordPress blog off WordPress and GoDaddy toward a static Jekyll site. 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