Quick start

Silen turns a directory of Markdown and MDX into a server-rendered static site, local search, and deterministic AI-readable output. Use Node.js ^20.19.0 || >=22.12.0.

Install and activate

From your project root, install Silen, then activate a docs directory:

pnpm add -D @aicode-nexus/silen
pnpm silen init docs

Silen installs its required react and react-dom runtime, including MDX's react/jsx-runtime, automatically.

init creates docs/.silen/config.ts and docs/index.mdx. It is safe for a new or existing directory: if either target already exists, Silen reports the collision instead of overwriting authored content.

Develop

pnpm silen dev docs

Edit docs/index.mdx or add another .md or .mdx file. File routes are created from the directory tree, and client navigation updates without a full page reload. Local search stays on the site; no hosted search account is required.

Build and inspect

pnpm silen build docs
pnpm silen preview docs

The default output directory is docs/.silen/dist. A build emits complete HTML plus AI artifacts such as llms.txt, llms-full.txt, ai-index.json, and clean Markdown routes. Draft pages and pages with ai: false remain out of those AI-facing artifacts.

Make the first decision explicit

Set base when the site will live below a host subpath, and set siteUrl to the origin when canonical metadata is required:

export default defineConfig({
  base: '/handbook/',
  siteUrl: 'https://docs.example.com',
  onBrokenLinks: 'error',
})

Continue with project structure, configuration, or inspect the live AI output.