Installation

The compiler, the optional components, and editor tooling.

Only the slurp CLI is required. Everything else on this page is optional. The Choosing components table lists what each piece covers.

The compiler

cargo install slurp-compiler

The crate is slurp-compiler and the binary it installs is slurp. That one binary does everything: build, validate, dev and gitignore.

Requires a Rust toolchain, 1.88 or newer. Slurp is on edition 2024, and its dependency tree pushes the floor from 1.85 up to 1.88. An older toolchain fails with feature "edition2024" is required rather than a version message, so run rustup update stable if you see that.

Verify it

slurp --version

slurp 0.1.0

A version number only proves the binary runs. Point it at a project to prove it works:

slurp validate --dir .

Validation ok: 4 file(s), 0 error(s), 0 warning(s).

validate exits 0 on success and 1 if anything failed, so it is safe to put in a script or a pre-commit hook.

Choosing components

Piece	Install	Use when
slurp CLI	cargo install slurp-compiler	Always. It builds and validates.
slurp-dev	cargo install slurp-dev-server	Hot reload while editing.
slurp-image	cargo install slurp-image	Templates use <Image>. Plain <img> needs nothing.
@bytesell/slurp-runtime	pnpm add @bytesell/slurp-runtime	Client navigation or Alpine on the page.
@bytesell/slurp-mcp	pnpm add -D @bytesell/slurp-mcp	A coding agent writes Slurp.
prettier-plugin-slurp	pnpm add -D prettier-plugin-slurp	Formatting with Prettier.
VS Code extension	see below	Editing .slurp files in VS Code.
slurp-compiler as a library	a Cargo dependency	Rendering templates from a Rust server.
@bytesell/slurp-compiler-wasm	pnpm add @bytesell/slurp-compiler-wasm	Rendering templates from JavaScript.

The dev server

cargo install slurp-dev-server

The crate is slurp-dev-server and the binary is slurp-dev. It watches a theme, rebuilds on change and pushes a reload over a WebSocket.

slurp dev is a launcher, not a second implementation: it looks for a slurp-dev binary next to the slurp binary, falls back to PATH, and forwards only --port and --fixtures. Without slurp-dev-server installed, slurp dev has nothing to launch. Invoke slurp-dev directly for the flags the launcher does not forward, such as --theme-dir, --globals or --backend-url.

The dev server binds 127.0.0.1 unconditionally and is not hardened for network exposure. It is a local tool.

See Dev server.

The image service

cargo install slurp-image
slurp-image --port 3001

An HTTP service that resizes and transcodes images on demand. It is required only when a template uses the <Image> component, which emits URLs pointing at it. A plain <img> tag involves no service.

It binds loopback and sends no CORS headers by default, because it fetches URLs an attacker may influence. See Images for running it and for what it refuses.

The browser runtime

pnpm add @bytesell/slurp-runtime

slurp build produces plain HTML and injects no script tag, so a page that does not need client navigation or {fetch} refetching ships no JavaScript from Slurp. A theme that wants the runtime loads it explicitly:

<script type="module" src="/slurp.core.js"></script>

ESM only, and no CommonJS build.

Read runtime/README.md before depending on any of it. Several runtime features are implemented and unit-tested but bind to markup the 0.1.0 compiler does not emit, so against the shipped compiler they attach to nothing and silently do no work. Those entry points are published under an experimental/ prefix to say so.

The MCP server

pnpm add -D @bytesell/slurp-mcp

An MCP server that gives a coding agent tools to validate, render, lint and inspect templates, plus the language reference.

It runs the real compiler in-process through @bytesell/slurp-compiler-wasm, so it needs no slurp binary on PATH. Requires Node 20 or newer.

Most clients can fetch it on demand rather than installing it:

Claude Code

claude mcp add slurp -- npx -y @bytesell/slurp-mcp

See Working with agents.

Editor tooling

Prettier

pnpm add -D prettier-plugin-slurp

Formats .slurp files. Prettier 3 is a peer dependency.

.prettierrc

{
  "plugins": ["prettier-plugin-slurp"]
}

VS Code

The extension gives syntax highlighting, completions, hover docs, go to definition and formatting. Build and install the .vsix from a clone:

cd vscode-extension
pnpm install && pnpm run build && pnpm run package
code --install-extension slurp-vscode-0.1.0.vsix

Requires VS Code 1.85 or newer, and Node 20 or newer to build.

Diagnostics do not work in 0.1.0, and they fail silently. slurp.validateOnType and slurp.validateOnSave default to true, so the feature looks live, but a file full of parse errors shows no squiggles and logs nothing. Highlighting, completions, hover and go to definition are fine. Until it is fixed, validate from the command line with slurp validate --dir . --warnings.

See Editor setup.

Embedding the compiler

To render templates from your own program rather than from the CLI:

Cargo.toml

[dependencies]
slurp-compiler = "0.1"

The Rust library does not minify; only the CLI does. See Embedding with Rust and the JavaScript API.

Building from a clone

git clone https://github.com/bytesell/slurp
cd slurp
cargo build --workspace --release

The three binaries land in target/release/ as slurp, slurp-dev and slurp-image. slurp dev prefers a slurp-dev sitting beside it, so a workspace build yields a working slurp dev with nothing installed.

The JavaScript packages are a separate build, and they need Node 22 or newer, pnpm 9 or newer, and wasm-pack:

pnpm install
pnpm build

pnpm build is what produces @bytesell/slurp-compiler-wasm, which the MCP server and the compiler integration tests both import, so run it before pnpm test on a fresh clone. CONTRIBUTING.md has the full gate list.

Next

Quickstart

Build and render a real page in about five minutes.

Project structure

Special directories, output paths, and static assets.

CLI

Every subcommand and flag.

Images

The <Image> component and the image service.