Gareth Bult

<p>Welcome to the Make Me Static Plugin for WordPress. This plugin is a static site generator and aims to create and maintain a static copy of your WordPress website within a Git repository. This version includes automatic access to a free Git solution and Page provider platform. (so no setup or credentials are necessary)</p>
<p>Alternatively the static site can be generated and stored in a GitLab Git Repository that can be used as a source for a static page platform such as CloudFlare Pages. The plugin provides customised sitemap and change tracking which connects to an external crawling service which does all the heavy lifting.</p>
<p>We have made great efforts in this version to minimise the configuration required to get going, if you have any problems (with anything) please let is know and we’ll do our best to help. Check out this YouTube video for an introduction to static front-ends and a walk-through of converting a pre-existing WordPress site into a WordPress site with a static front-end.</p>
<p><iframe loading="lazy" title="Converting a dynamic WordPress site into a WordPress site with a Static Front End using MakeMeStatic" width="750" height="422" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ZJ5IDgZ9u-Q?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></p>
<h3>How the service works</h3>
<p>The plugin connects to a directory service on the Internet at one of the directory URL’s listed below. This in turn will point the plugin to a ‘crawler’ that has been allocated to your site.<br />
When you ask the plugin to make a static copy of your site, it will instruct the crawler to visit all the pages on your site to determine which have changed since it’s last visit. Any changed pages will be copied to a Git repository, which in turn can publish pages directly to a page hosting service.</p>
<p>The default option is to use a Git account hosted by MadPenguin, and to publish the site on MadPenguin’s page hosting platform. As a result the default options do not require any specific Git or Page hosting configuration to get going. If on the other hand you choose to use a hosted Git service such as GitLab, you will need to enter some credentials for your online account, and from there configure your GitLab account to publish to a page hosting service.</p>
<p>Once you have successfully published a static copy of your site, all you need to do is point your domain at the address of the page hosting service, and asssuming your domain matches the one you<br />
entered when setting up your profile within the plugin, you should be up and running.</p>
<p>The service retains a metadata database for the site which includes file names, sizes and modification times, together with any credentials that have been added when creating a profile. (Sensitive credentials and other information is encrypted at rest).  The external service is responsible for all scanning and processing activities to mitigate strain on the WordPress server.<br />
The only private data transferred to the external service is the information you enter when creating a profile. All other information is obtained via an anonymous external scan, hence publically available. If you have selected the default Git option, then the service will also retain a static copy of the site.</p>
<h3>Useful references</h3>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://makemestatic.com/" rel="nofollow ugc">The service product page</a></li>
<li><a href="https://makemestatic.com/terms-and-conditions/" rel="nofollow ugc">Terms and Conditions of Service</a></li>
<li><a href="https://makemestatic.com/privacy-policy/" rel="nofollow ugc">Privacy Policy</a></li>
<li><a href="https://makemestatic.com/getting-started/" rel="nofollow ugc">Getting Started</a></li>
<li><a href="https://makemestatic.com/service-status/" rel="nofollow ugc">Service Status</a></li>
<li><a href="https://support.madpenguin.uk/" rel="nofollow ugc">Support Forum</a></li>
</ul>
<p>Make me static directory service URL’s;</p>
<ul>
<li>https://mms-directory-1.madpenguin.uk</li>
<li>https://mms-directory-2.madpenguin.uk</li>
<li>https://mms-directory-3.madpenguin.uk</li>
</ul>
<p>Other URL’s used to load code;</p>
<ul>
<li>https://assets.makemestatic.com, source for stage-2 crawler UI</li>
<li>https://status.makemestatic.com, endpoints that indicate the currently deployed version of a site</li>
<li>https://weblogs.makemestatic.com, source for dynamically loaded weblogs data / websockets</li>
<li>https://mms-crawler-*.madpenguin.uk, location of the actual crawlers (via websocket)</li>
</ul>
<p>Note that this in an integrated solution, the 3rd party crawling service is owned and operated by the plugin authors on a combination of cloud hosted and on premesis equipment.</p>
<h3>Live Web Statistics (<em>experimental</em>)</h3>
<p>If you opt to use the integrated Pages platform, this also provides a live WebStats option that uses the following URL;</p>
<ul>
<li>https://weblogs.makemestatic.com</li>
</ul>
<p>This allows live webstats to be seamlessly delivered into your control panel and updated in real-time via a websocket connection. Do not use this URL directly!<br />
This URL is only referenced once you click on the webstats icon next to your profile.</p>
<h3>How Does it work?</h3>
<p>The WordPress site is scanned by the MMS service under direction from the WordPress plugin. This off-loads the scanning process to specialised software which aims to minimise the loading on the WordPress server while scans are in progress.</p>
<p>There are three types of scan that can be performed;</p>
<ul>
<li>
<p>An “update”, which literally only looks at entries with changed sitemap timestamps<br />
(this is very quick and great for typo’s and any changes that only affect a single page)</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>A “synchronise”, typically this will scan every asset on the WordPress site and compare a checksum of each asset against it’s database to see if it’s changed since the last scan. Any changes are then transferred to the connected Git repository.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>A “Git verification”, this is like a “synchronise”, but also scans the Git repository for assets that are no longer referenced by the site (and removes them).</p>
</li>
</ul>
<p>As the site is scanned “from the outside” there should be no risk of the plugins actions exposing any data that isn’t already public. By the same token the external service has no ability to modify WordPress so the security footprint of the plugin is tiny.</p>
<h3>Feature bullet points</h3>
<ul>
<li>The plugin provides a way to produce a static copy of your website in a git repository</li>
<li>The result is compatible with both Github pages and CloudFlare pages for automatic publication</li>
<li>Multiple profiles are supported for (A+B_…) testing</li>
<li>Various scan rates are supported from one page per 5s to 7 cores flat out</li>
<li>Scheduled updates are supported and automated scanning</li>
<li>Currently “Gitlab” is supported with plans for GitHub and on-prem Gitlab</li>
<li>Support push services (WebPushr) to automatically notify subscribers on scan completion</li>
<li>Issue tracker for each profile to diagnose problems
<ul>
<li>Handles current and historical issues</li>
<li>Ability to acknowlede or delete issues when resolved</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li>GUI access to the internal asset database
<ul>
<li>Search as you type filtering</li>
<li>Pinning (force assets to be scanned regardless of perceived change)</li>
<li>Selective / manual queueing of assets for testing</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li>Ability to include manual / static assets in the scan (in the WP tree but unmanaged by WP)</li>
<li>Ability to exclude specific files and folders</li>
<li>Setup Wizard is included for a guided profile creation</li>
</ul>
<h3>The Technology</h3>
</p>
<ul>
<li>The Plugin presents as a WordPress Admin / plugin page</li>
<li>Backend connections are made over websockets using PKI</li>
<li>The crawler respects Robots.txt, (make sure the “MMSbot” agent is allowed on your site)</li>
<li>MMS Javascript runs in an isolated module and CSS “plays nice” with WordPress</li>
<li>Global CSS and theming is partitioned and user editable (if you feel the need …)</li>
<li>All of the front-end JS code and PHP is either GPL2 or MIT licensed</li>
<li>Backend-code is all based on the Orbit Framework (the framework and DB are all MIT licensed)</li>
<li>Orbit is a ‘real time’ framework, so the admin panel is 100% reactive.
<ul>
<li>Progress bar updates are typically “per percent” granularity</li>
<li>All statuses, totals, etc, are updated as they happen</li>
<li>Unless you’ve hit a bug, there is no mileage in reloading the MMS plugin page</li>
<li>If you change your license information, it will change in real-time</li>
<li>If the crawler allocated to your site changes (perhaps due to a license upgrade) then the<br />
appropriate version of the crawler UI will be uploaded “into” the page from the new<br />
crawler.</li>
</ul>
</li>
</ul>


Make Me Static, Static Site Generator, Git, Pages and Live Stats

Static site generator using Git for storage. Comes with free integrated Git + Pages solution including Live WebStats.

patrickposner

<p>Simply Static is a static site generator that converts your existing WordPress website to a static website that you can host on your server, a static hosting provider, or a CDN.</p>
<p>It drastically improves the performance of your website and minimizes security risks as it removes the connection between your traditional server and your static website.</p>
<p>Simply Static can also be used by local development tools like LocalWP or Lando to develop your website offline and push the static site online.</p>
<p>This reduces your hosting costs to zero (depending on your requirements and the used service/provider).</p>
<h4>Performance</h4>
<p>Converting your website to a static website can drastically improve your performance. Simply Static eliminates all requests to your database and by that reducing the first time to byte.</p>
<p>This is especially impactful for websites that use long pages with a lot of animations, graphs, and other load-heavy tools like sliders.</p>
<h4>Security</h4>
<p>Removing the connection to your database and traditional server reduces the risk of getting hacked.</p>
<p>This reduces the stress to keep your WordPress website up to date and keeps your data secure (locally or in a protected environment).</p>
<h4>Reduce hosting costs</h4>
<p>Using Simply Static to deploy your website to one of the static hosting providers, a CDN or an S3 bucket reduces the amount of money required for reliable web hosting.</p>
<p>With the right setup, you can even host your website completely for free (Cloudflare Pages and GitHub Pages for example).</p>
<h4>Local development</h4>
<p>Develop your site locally and only push the static exported website on a server. To ensure everything works as expected I created a list of development tools that are completely supported:</p>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://localwp.com/" rel="nofollow ugc">LocalWP</a></li>
<li><a href="https://docs.lando.dev/" rel="nofollow ugc">lando</a></li>
</ul>
<p>I highly recommend not to use another tool for local development if you are not a programmer as in most cases manual package installation is required.</p>
<h4>Static Studio</h4>
<p>Static Studio is our all-in-one Static WordPress cloud hosting solution – here is why you want it:</p>
<ul>
<li>Secure WordPress hosting (locked-down WP, Firewall, NGINX-powered, 24/7 monitoring)</li>
<li>Fast static site hosting via BunnyCDN (global distribution, low TTFB, caching, minification)</li>
<li>Secure logins via SSO, 2FA protection and team management</li>
<li>Automated (and free) migration for all your existing sites</li>
<li>Backups, SSL, unlimited file storage and 1TB bandwidth per site</li>
<li>WP-CLI, SSH, SFTP and hands-on code support</li>
</ul>
<p><a href="https://simplystatic.com/simply-static-studio/" rel="nofollow ugc">Start your 7-day free trial</a></p>
<h3>Simply Static Pro</h3>
<p>The pro version of Simply Static enhances the plugin with various features.</p>
<span class="embed-youtube" style="text-align:center; display: block;"><iframe loading="lazy" class="youtube-player" width="750" height="422" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Vml537IIwVc?version=3&rel=1&showsearch=0&showinfo=1&iv_load_policy=1&fs=1&hl=en-US&autohide=2&wmode=transparent" allowfullscreen="true" style="border:0;" sandbox="allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-presentation allow-popups-to-escape-sandbox"></iframe></span>
<h4>GitHub Integration</h4>
<p>With the GitHub integration, you can completely automate your entire development process.</p>
<p>The only thing you need is a GitHub account, no knowledge of Git or GitHub itself is required, as Simply Static Pro handles the entire process for you and keeps your repository up to date.</p>
<p>This allows deploying your static website to:</p>
<ul>
<li>GitHub Pages</li>
<li>Cloudflare Pages</li>
<li>Netlify</li>
<li>Vercel</li>
</ul>
<h4>AWS S3 Integration</h4>
<p>Export directly to Amazon AWS S3 from Simply Static Pro. Connect your bucket and run your export.</p>
<h4>SFTP</h4>
<p>Export directly to a remote SFTP server. Connect your server and run your export.</p>
<h4>BunnyCDN Integration</h4>
<p>Export directly to BunnyCDN and get all the benefits of their CDN – including caching, file optimization and DNS management.</p>
<h4>Incremental-, Builds and Single Exports</h4>
<p>Use Incremental Exports to update only changes to your static website. No configuration needed, just choose Update and run the export.</p>
<p>Use Build Exports to quickly roll out global changes to your static website. Want to update your style.css file? Or a new plugin? Use a build export.</p>
<p>Use Single Exports to quickly publish new pages and posts to your static site. This also supports scheduled posts.</p>
<h4>Forms</h4>
<p>Create and use forms created with your favorite form plugin on your static website with Simply Static Pro. Supported plugins are:</p>
<ul>
<li>Contact Form 7</li>
<li>Gravity Forms</li>
<li>WP Forms</li>
<li>FluentForms</li>
<li>WS Forms</li>
</ul>
<p>You can decide if you want to use an external service like Zapier and IFTTT to offload the submission (webhook) or embed the form from your WordPress website via iFrame.</p>
<h4>Search</h4>
<p>Use a fully static search solution that does not rely on any Third-Party-Providers. It uses Fuse.js and creates an index of your whole website as a JSON file.</p>
<p>The search supports autosuggestion and fuzzy logic and is by default way more convenient than your default WordPress search.</p>
<h4>Comments</h4>
<p>Enable comments on your static website without the requirement of Third-Party-Providers. Use your original WordPress website to process the comment.</p>
<p>After a comment was submitted, Simply Static automatically exports a new static version of the post. You don’t have to do anything.</p>
<h4>Multilingual</h4>
<p>Use WPML, Polylang or TranslatePress and run static exports per language or all at once.</p>
<p>Simply Static Pro also supports configuring settings per language, using the available language switchers and more to export a your multilingual website as easy as possible.</p>
<h4>WP-CLI</h4>
<p>Simply Static Pro has a detailed and comprehensive integration with WP-CLI.</p>
<p>Control every option, run different kinds of exports and more with the WP-CLI integration.</p>
<h4>Minification</h4>
<p>Automatically minfiy HTML, CSS and JavaScript files on your static site.</p>
<p>We can even minify inline CSS & JavaScript.</p>
<h4>Image Optimization</h4>
<p>Automatically optimize images on your static website with our ShortPixel API integration.</p>
<h4>Optimization</h4>
<p>Replace default WordPress paths and completely hide that you are using WordPress behind the scenes.</p>
<p>Replace:</p>
<ul>
<li>wp-content</li>
<li>wp-includes</li>
<li>wp-content/plugins/</li>
<li>wp-content/themes/</li>
<li>wp-content/uploads/</li>
</ul>
<p>Hide & Disable:</p>
<p>Disabled unwanted features in WordPress before running an static export like:</p>
<ul>
<li>XML-RPC</li>
<li>REST API URLs</li>
<li>Emoji support</li>
<li>Shortlink support</li>
<li>WordPress version in HTML</li>
</ul>
<p>and much more.</p>
<h4>Get the Pro version</h4>
<p>You can get the pro version <a href="https://simplystatic.com/pricing/" rel="nofollow ugc">here</a>.</p>
<h4>Simply Static Course</h4>
<p>We created an entire video course about Static WordPress with Simply Static – check out the first video:</p>
<span class="embed-youtube" style="text-align:center; display: block;"><iframe loading="lazy" class="youtube-player" width="750" height="422" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Ei_w-Jcq4uQ?version=3&rel=1&showsearch=0&showinfo=1&iv_load_policy=1&fs=1&hl=en-US&autohide=2&wmode=transparent" allowfullscreen="true" style="border:0;" sandbox="allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-presentation allow-popups-to-escape-sandbox"></iframe></span>
<p>You can watch the entire course entirely for free on YouTube here: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLcpe8_rNg8U5g1gCOa0Ge6T17f50nSvmg" rel="nofollow ugc">Simply Static Course</a></p>
<h4>Tutorials</h4>
<p>We also publish new tutorials on our blog every other week on how to work with Simply Static and other static site tools.</p>
<p>You can check the latest tutorials <a href="https://simplystatic.com/tutorials/" rel="nofollow ugc">here</a></p>
<h4>Documentation</h4>
<p>We have a super extensive documentation that covers every aspect of Simply Static and Simply Static Pro.</p>
<p>You can check the documentation <a href="https://docs.simplystatic.com" rel="nofollow ugc">here</a></p>


Simply Static – The Static Site Generator

Straight forward site conversion.

I was able to "freeze" my disused subdomains and store them in a new directory on my webserver with minimal fuss.

Perfect for sending a site into retirement


I've been a happy user for quite a while now. It does what you expect, generates a nice static site that I can upload to cheap static hosting. 



I upgraded to pro as I like the automatic publishing options via GitHub, which saves me a few minutes from manually uploading it to my host. 



Support responses have been fast and top-notch. Thanks to Patrick for building a great tool. 


A must for sites that don't need to be dynamic.


Thanks to this plugin, I have saved myself lots of time. Instead of converting my WordPress theme to one of the static site generators (Gatsby, Hugo ..etc), this plugin just did exactly the same but also I kept the powerful editing experience of WordPress. Thanks for making this. 


Worked perfectly


I had to archive some old  wp websites to static and had no problem doing so thanks to this incredible plugin.


works perfectly.


This plugin is supreme. As an experiment, I achieved a 100% free personal site with custom domain and SSL thanks to Simply Static and GitHub. I run WordPress locally with MAMP, generate static site files in a local repo then push to remote for GitHub Pages to serve. Bob's my uncle!



You can buy Pro too, you know. It's easier.


Thanks for helping make my personal site 100% free


I use this to export my local wordpress site to cloudflare pages - free hosting for life (or until cloudflare decides to charge for it).



Works like a charm.


Goodbye expensive hosting


Simply Static is a genius product, able to create static exports of even the largest sites. The user interface is modern, clean, and intuitive.  It's also developer-friendly, with hooks and filters galore.



But it's the support that is blowing my mind: responsive both in terms of responding to issues, but also getting improvements into the code and deployed. Above and beyond on all fronts. 💯


Top-tier Plugin and Support

Create a static website directly from your WordPress website with Simply Static.

Make Me Static, Static Site Generator, Git, Pages and Live Stats vs Simply Static – The Static Site Generator