markdisk-cms

File-based markdown publishing CMS with hierarchical sections, server-rendered HTML, and no editorial database.

Extracted from a production file-based publishing platform.

Features

• Markdown + YAML frontmatter — git-trackable content in content/blog/
• Hierarchical sections — nested folders and /section/:key URLs
• Search, author pages, RSS, sitemap
• Tag-based related posts and optional content linker (internal link injection)
• Read-finder widget (client-side article discovery)
• IndexNow hooks (optional, env-configured)
• Email-gated reports — SQLite capture + optional AWS SES PDF delivery

Quick start

git clone https://github.com/YOUR_USER/markdisk-cms.git
cd markdisk-cms
npm install
npm start

Open http://localhost:3080

Configuration

Edit config.js or set environment variables (see .env.example):

Option	Env var	Default
Port	PORT	3080
Base URL	BASE_URL	http://localhost:3080
Site name	SITE_NAME	Markdisk
IndexNow key	INDEXNOW_KEY	(disabled)
IndexNow host	INDEXNOW_HOST	(disabled)
SES from	SES_FROM_EMAIL	(optional)

Content model

Posts live under content/blog/{category}/{subcategory}/:

---
title: "My Article"
slug: my-article
date: 2026-07-01
author: Alex Morgan
excerpt: Short listing description.
section: guides/tutorials
tags: ["CMS", "Tutorial"]
---

Optional editorial CSS classes: .article-takeaway, .article-news (see demo posts).

Email-gated reports

emailGate: true
leadMagnetPdf: demo.pdf

Place PDFs in data/lead-magnets/pdfs/. Signups go to SQLite; configure AWS SES env vars to email download links.

Routes

Route	Description
/	Homepage
/section/:key	Section listing (supports parent/child keys)
/:section/:slug or /:section/:sub/:slug	Article
/author/:slug	Author profile
/search	Full-text search
/feed.xml	RSS
/sitemap.xml	Dynamic sitemap
/api/read-finder-index.json	Read-finder metadata API

Content linker

Audit and apply internal links:

npm run audit:links
node scripts/apply-pillar-internal-links.mjs

Manifest: data/internalLinks.json

Security

• Never commit .env files, SQLite signup databases (*.sqlite), or production PDFs. .gitignore blocks these by default.
• AWS credentials are read from the standard SDK chain (env vars or ~/.aws/credentials). Do not hardcode them in source.
• IndexNow keys belong in environment variables only. When enabled, the key is served publicly at /{key}.txt for search-engine verification — that is expected, but the key must not appear in committed code.
• Debug routes (/indexnow, /indexnow-verify-key, etc.) are disabled by default. Set ENABLE_DEBUG_ROUTES=true only for local troubleshooting.

License

GPL-3.0 — see LICENSE.