markdown "sync" site

A minimalist markdown site built with React, Convex, and Vite. Optimized for SEO, AI agents, 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.

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

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
• /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

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

2. Initialize Convex:

npx convex dev

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

3. Start the development server:

npm run dev

4. 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...

Images

Open Graph Images

Add an image field to frontmatter for social media previews:

image: "/images/my-header.png"

Recommended dimensions: 1200x630 pixels. Images can be local (/images/...) or external URLs.

Inline Images

Add images in markdown content:

![Alt text description](/images/screenshot.png)

Place image files in public/images/. The alt text displays as a caption.

Site Logo

Edit src/pages/Home.tsx to set your site logo:

const siteConfig = {
  logo: "/images/logo.svg", // Set to null to hide
  // ...
};

Replace public/images/logo.svg with your own logo file.

Featured Section

Posts and pages with featured: true in frontmatter appear in the featured section.

Add to Featured

Add these fields to any post or page frontmatter:

featured: true
featuredOrder: 1
excerpt: "A short description for the card view."

Then run npm run sync. No redeploy needed.

Field	Description
featured	Set true to show in featured section
featuredOrder	Order in featured section (lower = first)
excerpt	Short description for card view

Display Modes

The featured section supports two display modes:

• List view (default): Bullet list of links
• Card view: Grid of cards with title and excerpt

Users can toggle between views. To change the default:

const siteConfig = {
  featuredViewMode: "cards", // 'list' or 'cards'
  showViewToggle: true, // Allow users to switch views
};

Logo Gallery

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

Disable the gallery

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

Replace with your own logos

1. Add logo images to public/images/logos/ (SVG recommended)
2. Update the images array with logos and links:

logoGallery: {
  enabled: true,
  images: [
    { src: "/images/logos/your-logo-1.svg", href: "https://example.com" },
    { src: "/images/logos/your-logo-2.svg", href: "https://anothersite.com" },
  ],
  position: "above-footer", // or "below-featured"
  speed: 30, // Seconds for one scroll cycle
  title: "Trusted by", // Set to undefined to hide
},

Each logo object supports:

• src: Path to the logo image (required)
• href: URL to link to when clicked (optional)

Remove sample logos

Delete sample files from public/images/logos/ and replace the images array with your own logos, or set enabled: false to hide the gallery entirely.

The gallery uses CSS animations for smooth infinite scrolling. Logos appear grayscale and colorize on hover.

Favicon

Replace public/favicon.svg with your own icon. The default is a rounded square with the letter "m". Edit the SVG to change the letter or style.

Default Open Graph Image

The default OG image is used when posts do not have an image field. Replace public/images/og-default.svg with your own image (1200x630 recommended).

Update the reference in src/pages/Post.tsx:

const DEFAULT_OG_IMAGE = "/images/og-default.svg";

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

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).

2. Connect your repository to Netlify
3. Configure build settings:
   • Build command: npm ci --include=dev && npx convex deploy --cmd 'npm run build'
   • Publish directory: dist
4. 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.

How Blog Post Slugs Work

Slugs are defined in the frontmatter of each markdown file:

---
slug: "my-post-slug"
---

The slug becomes the URL path: yourdomain.com/my-post-slug

Rules:

• Slugs must be unique across all posts
• Use lowercase letters, numbers, and hyphens
• The sync script reads the slug field from frontmatter
• Posts are queried by slug using a Convex index

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:

body {
  /* Sans-serif option */
  font-family:
    -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, "Segoe UI", Roboto, Oxygen, Ubuntu,
    Cantarell, sans-serif;

  /* Serif option (default) */
  font-family:
    "New York",
    -apple-system-ui-serif,
    ui-serif,
    Georgia,
    Cambria,
    "Times New Roman",
    Times,
    serif;
}

Replace the font-family property with your preferred font stack.

Source

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