CLI Reference

Writedocs is meant to be installed globally (npm install -g writedocs, see Quickstart) — install it once, then run writedocs directly from inside any project’s own folder. No local package.json dependency, no per-project install step.

Every command takes an optional [dir] argument — the content directory containing writedocs.json and docs/. It defaults to the current directory, so you can cd into your docs project and run these with no arguments, or point them at a project elsewhere without cd-ing first:

writedocs dev              # serves the current directory
writedocs dev ./my-docs    # serves ./my-docs instead

Skipped the global install? Every command here also works prefixed with npx instead — npx writedocs dev — which downloads and runs Writedocs on the fly.

There’s no writedocs build here — building the static site and deploying it isn’t a step you run yourself. dev and init cover everything you need day to day.

`writedocs dev`

Starts a local dev server with hot reload.

writedocs dev [dir]

Flag	Description
`-p, --port <port>`	Port to run the dev server on.

writedocs dev --port 3000

`writedocs init`

Scaffolds writedocs.json and a starter docs/ folder.

writedocs init [dir]

Creates:

writedocs.json — a minimal config with one navigation group.
docs/index.mdx — a welcome page.
docs/getting-started.mdx — a short getting-started guide.

Existing files are never overwritten — init skips (and prints a message for) any file that already exists, so it’s safe to run again in a project you’ve already started customizing.