emdash-cms--emdash/templates/blank/AGENTS.md

This is an EmDash site -- a CMS built on Astro with a full admin UI.

Commands

npx emdash dev        # Start dev server (runs migrations, seeds, generates types)
npx emdash types      # Regenerate TypeScript types from schema

The admin UI is at http://localhost:4321/_emdash/admin.

Key Files

File	Purpose
astro.config.mjs	Astro config with emdash() integration, database, and storage
src/live.config.ts	EmDash loader registration (boilerplate -- don't modify)
seed/seed.json	Schema definition + demo content (collections, fields, taxonomies, menus, widgets)
emdash-env.d.ts	Generated types for collections (auto-regenerated on dev server start)
src/layouts/Base.astro	Base layout with EmDash wiring (menus, search, page contributions)
src/pages/	Astro pages -- all server-rendered

Skills

Agent skills are in .agents/skills/. Load them when working on specific tasks:

• building-emdash-site -- Querying content, rendering Portable Text, schema design, seed files, site features (menus, widgets, search, SEO, comments, bylines). Start here.
• creating-plugins -- Building EmDash plugins with hooks, storage, admin UI, API routes, and Portable Text block types.
• emdash-cli -- CLI commands for content management, seeding, type generation, and visual editing flow.

Documentation

The EmDash docs are available as an MCP server at https://docs.emdashcms.com/mcp. When you need to verify an API, hook, config option, field type, or pattern, call search_docs against the live documentation rather than relying on training-data recall. The docs reflect current behaviour; assumptions may not.

This template ships with .mcp.json, .cursor/mcp.json, and .vscode/mcp.json so Claude Code, Cursor, and VS Code auto-discover the docs server. Other tools (OpenCode, Windsurf, etc.) need a manual one-time setup -- see docs.emdashcms.com/docs-mcp.

Rules

• All content pages must be server-rendered (output: "server"). No getStaticPaths() for CMS content.
• Image fields are objects ({ src, alt }), not strings. Use <Image image={...} /> from "emdash/ui".
• entry.id is the slug (for URLs). entry.data.id is the database ULID (for API calls like getEntryTerms).
• Always call Astro.cache.set(cacheHint) on pages that query content.
• Taxonomy names in queries must match the seed's "name" field exactly (e.g., "category" not "categories").

This Template

The most minimal template. A single index.astro page with EmDash wired up and nothing else: no collections, no seed, no styles, no components, no layouts beyond what Astro provides by default.

Start here if you want full control from the beginning -- no schema or design decisions made for you.

Pages

Page	Path	What it shows
Home	/	A single Astro page with EmDash wiring

Schema

None. There are no collections, taxonomies, or menus seeded. You define everything via the admin UI (Schema -> Add collection) or by editing seed/seed.json once you create one.

What to do here

This template is a substrate, not a starting design. The natural first steps are:

1. Decide what content types the site needs (posts? events? products?) and define them in the admin under Schema, or by adding a seed/seed.json.
2. Add the pages that render that content (e.g. src/pages/posts/index.astro).
3. Add a layout in src/layouts/ for shared chrome.
4. Add styles -- this template has no theme.css and no fonts configured.

If any of that sounds like work you don't want to do, start from starter, blog, portfolio, or marketing instead. They make these decisions for you.

What not to do

• Don't expect this template to render a designed site out of the box. It won't.
• Don't add features here that should live in the EmDash core or in a plugin. This template is meant to stay small.