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CAX SSG - Static Site Generator in C

A Starter Project CAX SSG

C Static Site Generator

CAX SSG is a high-performance, zero-dependency static site generator written in pure C. Inspired by the developer experience of Eleventy and Jekyll, but engineered for raw C speed.

Read Documentation https://cax.axcora.com

Run Demo Project https://cax.axcora.com/starter/

C for Speed. Built by AXCORA.

C Platform License Speed

Support & Donate

If you like this project, please support:

Tech

Core

  • Pure C99 - No Node.js, Ruby, Python. Single binary.
  • Zero Dependencies - GCC + Make only.
  • Blazing Fast - Build 100 pages in < 50ms, < 5MB RAM.
  • Markdown + Frontmatter - YAML frontmatter support.

Features

  • Pagination Controllers - Any content/*.md with collection: + pagination: becomes a list page.
  • Dynamic Collections - Every folder in content/ is a collection.
  • Multi Layout Support - posts-list.cax, services-list.cax, portfolio-grid.cax - fully dynamic.
  • Advanced Template Engine - {{ variables }}, {% for %}, {% if %}, {% include %}.
  • Pagination Object - pagination.items, pagination.prev_url, pagination.next_url, pagination.current_page, pagination.total_pages, pagination.total_items.

SEO & Production Ready

  • Tags & Taxonomies - Automatic /tags/{tag}/ pages.
  • Sitemap - Full sitemap.xml including pagination pages.
  • Feeds - feed.xml, rss.xml, feed.json (JSON Feed 1.1).
  • Robots - Auto robots.txt with sitemap reference.
  • Built-in Server - cax start serves site/ at http://localhost:8080.

Installation

Prerequisites

  • GCC Compiler
  • Make (or MinGW32-make on Windows)

Build from Source

# Clone
git clone https://github.com/mesinkasir/cax.git
cd cax

# Windows
mingw32-make clean
mingw32-make

# Linux / macOS
make clean
make linux

Output: cax.exe (Windows) or cax (Linux/macOS).

Quick Start

cax init          # Initialize new project
cax build         # Build to site/
cax start         # Build + serve at http://localhost:8080

Project Structure

C:.
├── content/
│   ├── index.md                 # -> /index.html
│   ├── about.md                 # -> /about/index.html
│   ├── posts.md                 # Controller for posts collection
│   ├── services.md              # Controller for services collection
│   ├── posts/                   # Collection: posts
│   │   ├── why-c.md
│   │   └── template-engine.md
│   ├── products/                # Collection: products
│   └── services/                # Collection: services
├── templates/
│   ├── layouts/
│   │   ├── default.cax
│   │   ├── home.cax
│   │   ├── posts-list.cax       # List layout for posts
│   │   ├── services-list.cax    # List layout for services
│   │   ├── steampunk.cax
│   │   └── tag.cax
│   └── partials/
│       ├── header.cax
│       ├── footer.cax
│       └── index/
├── _data/
│   ├── metadata.json            # site.title, site.url, etc
│   ├── nav.json
│   └── config.json
├── public/
│   ├── css/style.css
│   └── img/
├── src/                         # C source
├── include/cax.h
├── site/                        # Generated output
│   ├── index.html
│   ├── sitemap.xml
│   ├── robots.txt
│   ├── feed.xml
│   ├── rss.xml
│   ├── feed.json
│   ├── posts/
│   │   ├── index.html
│   │   └── page/2/index.html
│   └── tags/
├── Makefile
└── cax.exe

Content Management

1. Basic Page

content/about.md:

---
title: About Us
description: Learn about CAX
layout: default.cax
---

This is about page.

2. Eleventy-Style Collection Controller

This is the core of CAX V2. Create a file content/posts.md to control the /posts/ listing.

content/posts.md:

---
layout: posts-list.cax
title: Blog - CAX SSG
description: All articles about CAX
collection: posts
pagination: 6
---

<p class="lead">Welcome to my blog. Here are all my articles.</p>

What it does:

  • collection: posts - Lists all markdown files from content/posts/
  • pagination: 6 - 6 items per page
  • layout: posts-list.cax - Uses this template
  • Output: /posts/, /posts/page/2/, /posts/page/3/

Another collection - content/services.md:

---
layout: services-list.cax
title: Our Services
collection: services
pagination: 9
---

3. Collection Item

content/posts/why-c.md:

---
title: Why C for SSG?
description: Performance benchmark
layout: post.cax
tags:
  - c
  - performance
---

Content here...

Templating

CAX uses .cax templates, compatible with Liquid-style syntax.

Variables

<title>{{ title }} - {{ site.title }}</title>
<meta name="description" content="{{ description }}">
{{ content }}

Includes

{% include header.cax %}
{% include footer.cax %}
{% include index/hero.cax %}

Loops - Eleventy Style

posts-list.cax:

<div class="row">
  {% for post in pagination.items %}
  <div class="col-md-4 mb-4">
    <div class="card">
      <div class="card-body">
        <h5 class="card-title">
          <a href="{{ post.url }}">{{ post.title }}</a>
        </h5>
        <p class="card-text">{{ post.description }}</p>
      </div>
    </div>
  </div>
  {% endfor %}
</div>

<nav class="d-flex justify-content-between">
  <div>
    {% if pagination.prev_url %}
    <a href="{{ pagination.prev_url }}" class="btn btn-primary">← Prev</a>
    {% endif %}
  </div>
  <div>
    {% if pagination.next_url %}
    <a href="{{ pagination.next_url }}" class="btn btn-primary">Next →</a>
    {% endif %}
  </div>
</nav>

Available Pagination Object:

Variable Description
pagination.items Array of posts for current page
pagination.current_page Current page number
pagination.total_pages Total pages
pagination.total_items Total items
pagination.prev_url Previous page URL
pagination.next_url Next page URL

Conditionals

{% if pagination.prev_url %}
  <a href="{{ pagination.prev_url }}">Previous</a>
{% endif %}

Data Files

_data/metadata.json:

{
  "site": {
    "title": "CAX Enterprise SSG",
    "description": "High performance Static Site Generator in C",
    "url": "https://cax.axcora.com",
    "author": "AXCORA"
  }
}

_data/nav.json:

{
  "nav1_name": "Home",
  "nav1_url": "/",
  "nav2_name": "Posts",
  "nav2_url": "/posts/",
  "nav3_name": "About",
  "nav3_url": "/about/"
}

Access in templates: {{ site.title }}, {{ nav1_name }}

SEO & Feeds

Auto-generated in site/ on every build:

  • sitemap.xml - All pages + collection pages + pagination pages
  • robots.txt - Allow all + Sitemap reference
  • feed.xml - RSS 2.0
  • rss.xml - RSS 2.0 alias
  • feed.json - JSON Feed 1.1

Verify after build:

http://localhost:8080/sitemap.xml
http://localhost:8080/robots.txt
http://localhost:8080/feed.xml
http://localhost:8080/feed.json

Commands Reference

Command Description
cax init Initialize new project structure
cax build Build static site to site/
cax start Build and start dev server at :8080
make clean / mingw32-make clean Clean object files

Performance

Metric Value
Build Time (100 pages) < 50ms
Binary Size < 500KB
Memory Usage < 5MB
Dependencies Zero

Written in pure C with custom Markdown parser, YAML frontmatter parser, and template engine.

Platform Support

Windows:

mingw32-make
./cax.exe build
./cax.exe start

Linux / macOS:

make linux
./cax build
./cax start

Author

AXCORA

Support & Donate

If you like this project, please support:

Documentation

Read Documentation https://cax.axcora.com

Run Demo Project https://cax.axcora.com/starter/

CAX SSG - Eleventy DX with C Speed.

About

Starter for CAX Static Site Generator buit in C

cax.axcora.com/

Topics

blogblog-articleblog-platformblog-templateblog-themebloggercstaticstatic-html-cssstatic-sitestatic-site-generationstatic-site-generatorstatic-websitewebsitewebsite-builderwebsite-designwebsite-developmentwebsite-generationwebsite-templatewebsites

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MIT license
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