The design of typost

typost turns a Typst program into a website. Typst is the authoring and structure language: there is no config DSL, no front-matter format, and no content convention.

The entry is the site

The entry file is a Typst program. It declares the site’s metadata and #includes every page — nothing is discovered from filenames:

#import "lib/typost.typ": site

#site(title: "typost demo")

#include "pages/home.typ"
#include "pages/about.typ"
#include "pages/blog.typ"

A page is a show rule

Each page is its own Typst file. It starts with a selectorless show rule that picks a layout; the rest of the file is the body, and named arguments other than route, layout, title, and tags become its front matter:

#import "lib/typost.typ": page

#show: page.with(route: "about/index.html", title: "About")

= About
...

A layout is called as layout(route, data, content), so the theme can render the nav, title, and byline around the body.

One render, many documents

typost compiles the entry in Typst’s experimental bundle target: a single compilation emits every document and asset. Because the pages share that bundle, they can query each other. The lists on the home and blog pages are not maintained by hand:

#context {
  for m in query(metadata).filter(m => /* …section == "blog"… */) [
    #link(m.value.typost.data.url, m.value.typost.data.title)
  ]
}

Plugins and the pipeline

Everything optional is a plugin. A plugin can contribute Typst modules, mutate the site manifest before render, and rewrite the exported files. They run at fixed stages:

config → typst(plugins) → eval-only → prepare(plugins) → render → post(plugins) → emit

This demo uses five:

• sitemap — writes sitemap.xml;
• feed — writes an Atom feed and links it from every page;
• encrypt — encrypts a content region at build time;
• taxonomies — generates a page per tag/category;
• spoiler — hover- and click-to-reveal regions.

Sites and plugins communicate through a metadata((typost: …)) channel that is lifted into the manifest before rendering, so the core stays free of any plugin’s concepts.