# Farewell to SynthWave82: the blog's old theme goes open source > MAuToBlog moves from a synthwave theme to a new wave one. The old theme, a companion since the blog was born, is not retiring: it becomes SynthWave82 Classic, open source on GitHub. - URL: https://mautoblog.com/en/posts/synthwave82-classic-farewell-hugo-theme-2026/ - Language: en - Published: 2026-10-16 - Author: Matteo - Categories: Projects - Tags: Open Source - Translation (it): https://mautoblog.com/posts/synthwave82-classic-onore-delle-armi-tema-hugo-2026/ --- Some changes come from a need, others start as a **simple whim**. This blog is moving from a **synthwave** theme to a **new wave** one, and there is probably a bit of both in it: the urge to try something new, a few features I was starting to miss, and that hard-to-explain habit of tinkering with things even when they already work well enough. [The old theme](https://github.com/Mauto82/hugo-SynthWave82-classic), after all, has been a bit like an **old friend**. The kind you have shared many battles with, a few satisfactions and an uncounted number of hours spent trying to make things work that, on paper, should have worked on their own. We argued, we made compromises and in the end we found a balance. It wasn't perfect, but **it was home**. And when something becomes home, even its flaws end up feeling familiar. Changing theme, though, isn't just changing colours, fonts and layout. It's a bit like **moving house**. You realise that, in the meantime, you had grown fond of the little things you had fixed almost by chance at the start. A feature you lost a whole evening over, a detail you tried to get working in every possible way, a change born from feedback or from a need you hadn't foreseen. And then the first tests, the first reactions, the things that didn't work and the ones that, against all expectations, worked perfectly. The funny thing is that [this blog](/en/the-blog/) **wasn't even meant to become a blog**. I simply had to try [Hugo](https://gohugo.io/). To have something to publish, I took some work notes and asked one of the first AI models I was using to **turn them into articles**. The result was, let's say, rather rough. But it was enough to run a few tests, understand how everything worked and start playing. Then, as often happens with these things, the project started going its own way. And what was meant to be **a simple experiment** filled up with small changes, attempts, ideas and memories. ## Almost three years together The logbook, in cases like this, is the git history: it forgets nothing, not even the commit messages you wish you had written better. - **13 November 2023**: the first commit and the first post. The theme I'm talking about didn't exist yet. - **11 December 2023**: *my personal hugo theme, first commit*. The theme that would later become SynthWave82 is born. - **17 October 2024**: the cookie banner arrives, at first with iubenda. - **15 November 2024**: the first big round of improvements to the site search. - **21 November 2024**: the blog moves to Netlify. - **25 January 2025**: the guides section is born. The commit message, word for word, says *creazione sezione guide (comincia a funzionare)*, "guides section created (starting to work)": that "starting" says it all. - **26 February 2026**: the first English version. - **15 April 2026**: statistics move to Umami, self-hosted and cookie-free. In between, almost 800 commits: 39 in 2023, 310 in 2024, 190 in 2025 and 242 in 2026, which isn't over yet. ## What changes with New Wave The new theme is called New Wave, and the name is no accident: the neon stays, with a palette taken from a vaporwave poster (hot pink, cyan, periwinkle and yellow), but the idea behind it is different. The blog now looks like a code editor. - **Windows instead of heroes.** No more images at the top of the pages: every section is a terminal window, with the three dots and the path in its bar (`mautoblog: ~/guide`). Archive, guides and categories are folders to open, like in an editor's explorer, and search answers like `grep`. - **Posts as open files.** The file name in the tab; date, categories and author as the front matter of a Markdown file; the title with its `#`. The article outline opens with a button, when you need it, instead of always taking up half the screen. - **Guides, finally, inside the posts.** Before, a guide only existed on its own page: whoever landed from Google on part 3 had no idea they were halfway through a series. Now every part says `series: Local AI/ · part 2/3`, leads to the previous and next part, and every guide has a page of its own. The blog also remembers, only in your browser, the parts you have already read, and offers to continue from where you left off. - **A background that moves.** A violet gradient and a few symbols, `{ }`, ``, `λ` and the AI sparkle, rising slowly, almost transparent. The top bar now lets it show through. - **Phones, taken seriously.** A menu with bigger items to tap, no more pages sliding sideways. ## Donating it to science Not everyone found the change painless. Someone wrote to me through the contact form, a little sad: they barely recognised the site anymore. I can sort of understand that. And the old theme? Throwing it away would have been a shame, and keeping it in a drawer even worse. So I decided to donate it to science. I know it would have wanted it this way: it's a way to keep being useful even when it's no longer around. It's called **SynthWave82 Classic** and it is exactly the theme that served this blog until 14 October 2026, with its neon heroes, the palm trees and the lighthouse. ![The MAuToBlog home page with SynthWave82, as it was until 14 October 2026](/img/posts/synthwave82-classic-onore-delle-armi-tema-hugo-2026.jpg) Everything that grew over these years is in there: - Italian and English, with a language switcher and `hreflang` tags for Google; - site search, guides grouped into series, an archive by year and month, related posts and a share bar; - structured data, a clean sitemap, an `llms.txt` and a Markdown version of every page for AI agents; - no cookies, a consent banner that stores your choice only in the browser and, if you want them, integrations with Umami, Giscus and Netlify forms. It's open source under the MIT licence: you'll find it on GitHub at [Mauto82/hugo-SynthWave82-classic](https://github.com/Mauto82/hugo-SynthWave82-classic). Two steps are enough to use it: ```bash git clone https://github.com/Mauto82/hugo-SynthWave82-classic themes/synthwave82-classic ``` Then set `theme = "synthwave82-classic"` in your site configuration. The repository also includes an example site to start from. In the end, every move ends the same way: with a bunch of keys in your hand and the old, empty house behind you. I'm not throwing these keys away. I'm leaving them on GitHub, for anyone who feels like living there. Maybe they'll move some furniture, repaint the walls or find a flaw I never noticed. That's fine: it's the best way I know to say thank you to an old friend.