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An open-source publishing framework for AI agents and developers. Write markdown, sync from the terminal. Your content is instantly available to browsers, LLMs, and AI agents. Built on Convex and Netlify.

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waynesutton/markdown-site

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markdown "sync" framework

An open-source publishing framework for AI agents and developers. Write markdown, sync from the terminal. Your content is instantly available to browsers, LLMs, and AI agents. Built on Convex and Netlify.

Write markdown locally, run npm run sync (dev) or npm run sync:prod (production), and content appears instantly across all connected browsers. Built with React, Convex, and Vite. Optimized for AEO, GEO, and LLM discovery.

How publishing works: Write posts in markdown, run npm run sync for development or npm run sync:prod for production, and they appear on your live site immediately. No rebuild or redeploy needed. Convex handles real-time data sync, so all connected browsers update automatically.

How versioning works: Markdown files live in content/blog/ and content/pages/. These are regular files in your git repo. Commit changes, review diffs, roll back like any codebase. The sync command pushes content to Convex.

# Edit, commit, sync
git add content/blog/my-post.md
git commit -m "Update post"
npm run sync        # dev
npm run sync:prod   # production

Documentation

Fork Configuration

After forking this project, you have two options to configure your site:

Option 1: Automated (Recommended)

Run a single command to configure all files automatically:

# Copy the example config
cp fork-config.json.example fork-config.json

# Edit with your site information
# Open fork-config.json and update the values

# Apply all changes
npm run configure

This updates all 11 configuration files in one step.

Option 2: Manual

Follow the step-by-step guide in FORK_CONFIG.md to update each file manually. This guide includes code snippets and an AI agent prompt for assistance.

Features

  • Markdown-based blog posts with frontmatter
  • Syntax highlighting for code blocks
  • Four theme options: Dark, Light, Tan (default), Cloud
  • Real-time data with Convex
  • Fully responsive design
  • Real-time analytics at /stats
  • Full text search with Command+K shortcut
  • Featured section with list/card view toggle
  • Logo gallery with continuous marquee scroll
  • GitHub contributions graph with year navigation
  • Static raw markdown files at /raw/{slug}.md
  • Dedicated blog page with configurable navigation order
  • Markdown writing page at /write with frontmatter reference

SEO and Discovery

  • RSS feeds at /rss.xml and /rss-full.xml (with full content)
  • Dynamic sitemap at /sitemap.xml
  • JSON-LD structured data for Google rich results
  • Open Graph and Twitter Card meta tags
  • robots.txt with AI crawler rules
  • llms.txt for AI agent discovery

AI and LLM Access

  • /api/posts - JSON list of all posts for agents
  • /api/post?slug=xxx - Single post JSON or markdown
  • /api/export - Batch export all posts with full content
  • /raw/{slug}.md - Static raw markdown files for each post and page
  • /rss-full.xml - Full content RSS for LLM ingestion
  • /.well-known/ai-plugin.json - AI plugin manifest
  • /openapi.yaml - OpenAPI 3.0 specification
  • Copy Page dropdown for sharing to ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity (uses raw markdown URLs for better AI parsing)

Content Import

  • Import external URLs as markdown posts using Firecrawl
  • Run npm run import <url> to scrape and create draft posts locally
  • Then sync to dev or prod with npm run sync or npm run sync:prod

Getting Started

Prerequisites

  • Node.js 18 or higher
  • A Convex account

Setup

  1. Install dependencies:
npm install
  1. Initialize Convex:
npx convex dev

This will create your Convex project and generate the .env.local file.

  1. Start the development server:
npm run dev
  1. Open http://localhost:5173

Writing Blog Posts

Create markdown files in content/blog/ with frontmatter:

Static Pages (Optional)

Create optional pages like About, Projects, or Contact in content/pages/:

---
title: "About"
slug: "about"
published: true
order: 1
---

Your page content here...

Pages appear as navigation links in the top right, next to the theme toggle. The order field controls display order (lower numbers first).

---
title: "Your Post Title"
description: "A brief description"
date: "2025-01-15"
slug: "your-post-slug"
published: true
tags: ["tag1", "tag2"]
readTime: "5 min read"
image: "/images/my-header.png"
excerpt: "Short text for featured cards"
---

Your markdown content here...

Logo Gallery

The homepage includes a scrolling logo gallery with sample logos. Configure in siteConfig:

Disable the gallery

logoGallery: {
  enabled: false,
  // ...
},

GitHub Contributions Graph

Display your GitHub contribution activity on the homepage. Configure in src/config/siteConfig.ts:

gitHubContributions: {
  enabled: true,           // Set to false to hide
  username: "yourusername", // Your GitHub username
  showYearNavigation: true, // Show arrows to navigate between years
  linkToProfile: true,      // Click graph to open GitHub profile
  title: "GitHub Activity", // Optional title above the graph
},

Visitor Map

Display real-time visitor locations on a world map on the stats page. Uses Netlify's built-in geo detection (no third-party API needed). Privacy friendly: only stores city, country, and coordinates. No IP addresses stored.

Configure in src/config/siteConfig.ts:

visitorMap: {
  enabled: true,        // Set to false to hide the visitor map
  title: "Live Visitors", // Optional title above the map
},

Syncing Posts

Posts are synced to Convex. The sync script reads markdown files from content/blog/ and content/pages/, then uploads them to your Convex database.

Environment Files

File Purpose
.env.local Development deployment URL (created by npx convex dev)
.env.production.local Production deployment URL (create manually)

Both files are gitignored. Each developer creates their own.

Sync Commands

Command Target When to use
npm run sync Development Local testing, new posts
npm run sync:prod Production Deploy content to live site

Development sync:

npm run sync

Production sync:

First, create .env.production.local with your production Convex URL:

VITE_CONVEX_URL=https://your-prod-deployment.convex.cloud

Then sync:

npm run sync:prod

Deployment

Netlify

Netlify Status

For detailed setup, see the Convex Netlify Deployment Guide.

  1. Deploy Convex functions to production:
npx convex deploy

Note the production URL (e.g., https://your-deployment.convex.cloud).

  1. Connect your repository to Netlify
  2. Configure build settings:
    • Build command: npm ci --include=dev && npx convex deploy --cmd 'npm run build'
    • Publish directory: dist
  3. Add environment variables in Netlify dashboard:
    • CONVEX_DEPLOY_KEY - Generate from Convex Dashboard > Project Settings > Deploy Key
    • VITE_CONVEX_URL - Your production Convex URL (e.g., https://your-deployment.convex.cloud)

The CONVEX_DEPLOY_KEY deploys functions at build time. The VITE_CONVEX_URL is required for edge functions (RSS, sitemap, API) to proxy requests at runtime.

Build issues? Netlify sets NODE_ENV=production which skips devDependencies. The --include=dev flag fixes this. See netlify-deploy-fix.md for detailed troubleshooting.

Project Structure

markdown-site/
├── content/blog/      # Markdown blog posts
├── convex/            # Convex backend
│   ├── http.ts        # HTTP endpoints (sitemap, API, RSS)
│   ├── posts.ts       # Post queries and mutations
│   ├── rss.ts         # RSS feed generation
│   └── schema.ts      # Database schema
├── netlify/           # Netlify edge functions
│   └── edge-functions/
│       ├── rss.ts     # RSS feed proxy
│       ├── sitemap.ts # Sitemap proxy
│       ├── api.ts     # API endpoint proxy
│       └── botMeta.ts # OG crawler detection
├── public/            # Static assets
│   ├── images/        # Blog images and OG images
│   ├── robots.txt     # Crawler rules
│   └── llms.txt       # AI agent discovery
├── scripts/           # Build scripts
└── src/
    ├── components/    # React components
    ├── context/       # Theme context
    ├── pages/         # Page components
    └── styles/        # Global CSS

Scripts Reference

Script Description
npm run dev Start Vite dev server
npm run dev:convex Start Convex dev backend
npm run sync Sync posts to dev deployment
npm run sync:prod Sync posts to production deployment
npm run import Import URL as local markdown draft (then sync)
npm run build Build for production
npm run deploy Sync + build (for manual deploys)
npm run deploy:prod Deploy Convex functions + sync to production

Tech Stack

  • React 18
  • TypeScript
  • Vite
  • Convex
  • react-markdown
  • react-syntax-highlighter
  • date-fns
  • lucide-react
  • @phosphor-icons/react
  • Netlify

Search

Press Command+K (Mac) or Ctrl+K (Windows/Linux) to open the search modal. The search uses Convex full text search to find posts and pages by title and content.

Features:

  • Real-time results as you type
  • Keyboard navigation (arrow keys, Enter, Escape)
  • Result snippets with context around matches
  • Distinguishes between posts and pages
  • Works with all four themes

The search icon appears in the top navigation bar next to the theme toggle.

Real-time Stats

The /stats page shows real-time analytics powered by Convex:

  • Active visitors: Current visitors on the site with per-page breakdown
  • Total page views: All-time view count
  • Unique visitors: Based on anonymous session IDs
  • Views by page: List of all pages sorted by view count

Stats update automatically via Convex subscriptions. No page refresh needed.

How it works:

  • Page views are recorded as event records (not counters) to avoid write conflicts
  • Active sessions use heartbeat presence (30s interval, 2min timeout)
  • A cron job cleans up stale sessions every 5 minutes
  • No PII stored (only anonymous session UUIDs)

API Endpoints

Endpoint Description
/stats Real-time site analytics
/rss.xml RSS feed with post descriptions
/rss-full.xml RSS feed with full post content
/sitemap.xml Dynamic XML sitemap
/api/posts JSON list of all posts
/api/post?slug=xxx Single post as JSON
/api/post?slug=xxx&format=md Single post as markdown
/api/export Batch export all posts with content
/meta/post?slug=xxx Open Graph HTML for crawlers
/.well-known/ai-plugin.json AI plugin manifest
/openapi.yaml OpenAPI 3.0 specification
/llms.txt AI agent discovery

Import External Content

Use Firecrawl to import articles from external URLs as markdown posts:

npm run import https://example.com/article

This will:

  1. Scrape the URL using Firecrawl API
  2. Convert to clean markdown
  3. Create a draft post in content/blog/ locally
  4. Add frontmatter with title, description, and today's date

Setup:

  1. Get an API key from firecrawl.dev
  2. Add to .env.local:
FIRECRAWL_API_KEY=fc-your-api-key

Why no npm run import:prod? The import command only creates local markdown files. It does not interact with Convex. After importing, sync to your target environment:

  • npm run sync for development
  • npm run sync:prod for production

Imported posts are created as drafts (published: false). Review, edit, set published: true, then sync.

Theme Configuration

The default theme is Tan. Users can cycle through themes using the toggle:

  • Dark (Moon icon)
  • Light (Sun icon)
  • Tan (Half icon) - default
  • Cloud (Cloud icon)

To change the default theme, edit src/context/ThemeContext.tsx:

const DEFAULT_THEME: Theme = "tan"; // Change to "dark", "light", or "cloud"

Font Configuration

The blog uses a serif font (New York) by default. To switch fonts, edit src/styles/global.css:

Font Sizes

All font sizes use CSS variables defined in :root. Customize sizes by editing the variables:

Write Page

A public markdown writing page at /write (not linked in navigation).

Access directly at yourdomain.com/write. Content is stored in localStorage only (not synced to database). Use it to draft posts, then copy the content to a markdown file in content/blog/ or content/pages/ and run npm run sync.

Source

Fork this project: github.com/waynesutton/markdown-site

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License.

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An open-source publishing framework for AI agents and developers. Write markdown, sync from the terminal. Your content is instantly available to browsers, LLMs, and AI agents. Built on Convex and Netlify.

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