Emdash Cms

# EmDash CMS

> Skill by [ara.so](https://ara.so) — Daily 2026 Skills collection.

EmDash is a full-stack TypeScript CMS built on Astro and Cloudflare. It is the spiritual successor to WordPress: extensible, developer-friendly, and powered by a plugin system that runs plugins in sandboxed Worker isolates rather than with full filesystem/database access. EmDash stores rich text as Portable Text (structured JSON) rather than HTML, supports passkey-first auth, and runs on Cloudflare (D1 + R2 + Workers) or any Node.js server with SQLite.

---

## Installation

### Scaffold a new project

```bash
npm create emdash@latest
```

Follow the prompts to choose a template (blog, marketing, portfolio, starter, blank) and a platform (Cloudflare or Node.js/SQLite).

### Deploy to Cloudflare directly

Use the one-click deploy button from the README, or:

```bash
npm create emdash@latest -- --template blog-cloudflare
cd my-site
npm run deploy
```

### Add EmDash to an existing Astro project

```bash
npm install emdash
```

```typescript
// astro.config.mjs
import { defineConfig } from "astro/config";
import emdash from "emdash/astro";
import { d1 } from "emdash/db";

export default defineConfig({
  integrations: [
    emdash({
      database: d1(), // Cloudflare D1
    }),
  ],
});
```

For Node.js + SQLite (no Cloudflare account needed):

```typescript
// astro.config.mjs
import { defineConfig } from "astro/config";
import emdash from "emdash/astro";
import { sqlite } from "emdash/db";

export default defineConfig({
  integrations: [
    emdash({
      database: sqlite({ path: "./content.db" }),
    }),
  ],
});
```

---

## Key CLI Commands

```bash
# Scaffold a new EmDash project
npm create emdash@latest

# Generate TypeScript types from your live schema
npx emdash types

# Seed the demo site with sample content
npx emdash seed

# Run database migrations
npx emdash migrate

# Start the dev server (standard Astro command)
npx astro dev

# Build for production
npx astro build

# Open admin panel (after dev server starts)
open http://localhost:4321/_emdash/admin
```

### Monorepo / contributor commands

```bash
pnpm install
pnpm build
pnpm test          # run all tests
pnpm typecheck     # TypeScript check
pnpm lint:quick    # fast lint (< 1s)
pnpm format        # format with oxfmt

# Run the demo (Node.js + SQLite, no Cloudflare needed)
pnpm --filter emdash-demo seed
pnpm --filter emdash-demo dev
```

---

## Configuration

### Cloudflare (D1 + R2 + KV + Worker Loaders)

```jsonc
// wrangler.jsonc
{
  "name": "my-emdash-site",
  "compatibility_date": "2025-01-01",
  "d1_databases": [
    {
      "binding": "DB",
      "database_name": "emdash-content",
      "database_id": "$DATABASE_ID"
    }
  ],
  "r2_buckets": [
    {
      "binding": "MEDIA",
      "bucket_name": "emdash-media"
    }
  ],
  "kv_namespaces": [
    {
      "binding": "SESSIONS",
      "id": "$KV_NAMESPACE_ID"
    }
  ],
  // Remove this block to disable sandboxed plugins (free accounts)
  "worker_loaders": [
    {
      "binding": "PLUGIN_LOADER"
    }
  ]
}
```

```typescript
// astro.config.mjs
import emdash from "emdash/astro";
import { d1 } from "emdash/db";
import { r2 } from "emdash/storage";
import { kv } from "emdash/sessions";

export default defineConfig({
  integrations: [
    emdash({
      database: d1({ binding: "DB" }),
      storage: r2({ binding: "MEDIA" }),
      sessions: kv({ binding: "SESSIONS" }),
    }),
  ],
});
```

### Node.js + SQLite

```typescript
// astro.config.mjs
import emdash from "emdash/astro";
import { sqlite } from