Genereto

A simple static site generator to handle different kinds of simple static websites.

🔗 GitHub Repository - Source code, issues, and releases
📖 Read the Blog → - Tutorials, guides, and tips for using Genereto

Features
Quick Start Tutorial
CLI Reference
Config Reference
Metadata Fields Reference
Templating Guide
Advanced Features

Features

With Genereto, you can:

Generate a simple static website with a single or multiple pages.
Generate a blog with articles.
Generate a tumblr style website.
Generate a simple static website along with a blog - like this website.

You should use Genereto if you want:

A complete and easy way to create a static website
Metadata stored along with the website content written in Markdown
A super simple templating system
Fast compilation
And more:
- TODOs and comments embeddable in your pages
- Drafts support
- Tumblr style websites
- Automatic RSS feed generation

Quick Start Tutorial

Installation

Recommended: Download the latest pre-built binary for Linux from GitHub Releases

# Download and extract
wget https://github.com/FedericoPonzi/genereto/releases/latest/download/genereto-*-linux-x86_64.tar.gz
tar -xzf genereto-*-linux-x86_64.tar.gz

Alternative: Build from source with cargo build --release

Usage

Create a new project:

./genereto generate-project --project-path ./my-site

Create a new file in my-site/content/index.md:

---
title: My First Page
description: Welcome to my site
---
# Welcome!
This is my first page.

Build your site:

./genereto --project-path ./my-site

💡 Tip: Use the sample project as reference: check out sample-genereto-project folder in this repository. The generate project command will basically clone this folder.

CLI Reference

# Basic usage
genereto --project-path <PATH>

# Generate new project
genereto generate-project --project-path <PATH> [--override-git]

# Draft options
genereto --project-path <PATH> --drafts-options <OPTION>

Draft options:

build (default): Builds draft pages but doesn't link them (from the index page).
dev: Treats drafts as normal pages
hide: Completely skips draft pages

Config Reference

The config.yml file in your project root defines the site configuration:

template: string              # Template directory name to use.
template_base_path: string    # Custom path to templates folder (relative or absolute). By default will use project-path + "templates"
title: string                 # Website title (used in RSS)
url: string                   # Website URL (used in RSS)
description: string           # Website description (used in RSS)

# Blog configuration (optional)
blog:
  default_cover_image: string  # Default image for pages without cover
  base_template: index.html    # Template for blog's article pages
  index_name: index.html       # Name of the blog index file
  destination: ""              # Blog output subdirectory
  generate_single_pages: true  # Generate individual article pages
  title: string                # Optional blog-specific title

Directory Structure

content/: Markdown files and assets
templates/: Default directory for HTML templates (unless template_base_path is specified)
output/: Generated site (created automatically)

💡 Note: When template_base_path is specified in config.yml, templates will be searched in that location instead of the default templates/ directory. The path can be relative to the project root or absolute.

Metadata Fields Reference

Available metadata fields for pages and articles:

Field	Type	Description	Default
`title`	string	Page/article title	Required
`publish_date`	string	Publication date (YYYY-mm-dd). Posts with future dates are treated as drafts.	Optional
`is_draft`	bool	Draft status	`false`
`keywords`	string	Comma-separated keywords	Optional
`show_table_of_contents`	bool	Enable ToC generation	`false`
`add_title`	bool	Auto-add H1 title from metadata	`false`
`description`	string	Brief description (first 150 chars if not provided)	Optional
`cover_image`	string	Path to cover image	Optional
`url`	string	External URL for the article. This will be available as article_url.	Optional
`current_year`	string	Current year (auto-generated)	Auto
`custom_fields`	any	Any additional key-value pairs	Optional

⚠️ Notes:

Articles with TODOs are automatically marked as drafts regardless of is_draft setting

Articles with future publish dates are automatically marked as drafts

If no description is provided, the first 150 characters of content will be used

Cover images can be relative paths or full URLs

Templating Guide

Templates require two main files:

index.html: For listing blog articles
blog.html: For individual articles

Content replacement section:

<!-- start_content -->
Content here will be replaced
<!-- end_content -->

Variables are accessed using:

$GENERETO['variable_name']

💡 Tip: Use the content between start/end_content markers to preview your template's appearance.

Advanced Features

Custom Metadata

You can add any custom key-value pairs to your page metadata, which will be available in templates as $GENERETO['key']:

---
title: My Collaborative Post
publish_date: 2024-01-01
co_authors: John Doe, Jane Smith
project_url: https://github.com/example
---

# My Post
Written by $GENERETO['co_authors']
Check out the project at $GENERETO['project_url']

Any key-value pair that isn't a standard metadata field will be treated as custom metadata and made available in templates.

RSS Feed

Genereto automatically generates an RSS feed. Add to your template:

<link rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml" title="RSS Feed" href="rss.xml" />

TODOs and Comments

Embed TODOs and comments in your content:

$GENERETO&#123;TODO: fix this section&#125;
This is my content $GENERETO&#123;add more details here&#125;

Blog YAML Format

For tumblr-style blogs, use blog.yml:

entries:
  - title: My Post
    publish_date: 2024-01-01
    description: Quick update

💡 Tip: YAML entries support all the same metadata fields as markdown articles.

For more details, check out the introduction article.

Genereto Documentation