Features

Index pages

Ter recursively recreates the source file system on the rendered site and each directory gets an index file listing its content. For example, if the source looks like this:

content
├── index.md
├── about-me.md
└── life
    ├── failed-startup-ideas.md
    └── thoughts-on-life.md

... the life directory will get an life/index.html page with an index of its content.

Index sorting

Items in the index are sorted in the following order:

files with pinned: true in the frontmatter are listed at the top and get an ★ symbol;
directories (child index pages);
rest of markdown files, sorted by date.

Markdown in index files

If the source directory contains an index.md file, its content will be injected into the rendered index.html above the index list. This can be useful for describing what the directory content is about or additionally calling out individual pages from the index.

Backlinks

Ter adheres to the Zettelksten method and tracks connections between pages. All internal references to the current page are listed in the Backlinks section at the bottom.

Frontmatter

Ter extracts YAML frontmatter delimited by --- from markdown files. Here’s an example:

---
title: My page
description: Here’s my description
date: 2022-01-29
tags:
  - myTag
  - otherTag
property: value
---

## My content

Special properties

Some properties are utilized when building a site.

Property	Description
`title`	used for page title
`description`	used for page description
`date`	used for date
`tags`	used for tags
`pinned`	if set to `true`, page is listed at the top of index lists
`toc`	if set to `true`, page renders table of contents at the top
`draft`	if set to `true`, file is ignored during site generation
`unlisted`	same as `draft`

Other properties

All other properties are ignored but can be used in templates.

Ignoring files

Any files and folders that start with an _ or . (hidden) are ignored. For example, if there is a _drafts folder in the content directory, it will be skipped during site generation.

In addition, it’s possible to ignore individual markdown files by setting either unlisted: true or draft: true in the YAML frontmatter.

Dates

Ter tries to replicate the content file system on the generated site. And with that philosophy, the dates displayed on pages and in the index lists default to file creation date.

To use a custom date, set the date key in the YAML frontmatter in YYYY-MM-DD format.

Date example

—
date: 1995-12-31
—

# My page

Breadcrumbs

TODO

Titles