A sharp, modern markdown editor with inline rendering.
_{Built with Electron, CodeMirror 6, React, and SQLite.}

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What is Inku?

Inku (インク, "ink") is a markdown editor that renders your writing inline as you type — no split panes, no preview toggle. When the cursor is on a line, you see raw markdown. Move away, and it renders beautifully in place.

Sharp design. Violet accents on dark surfaces. Tight spacing. No clutter.

Features

Editor

• Single-pane inline rendering (headings, bold, italic, code, links, images, tables, checkboxes)
• Clickable checkboxes that toggle in the source
• Fenced code blocks with syntax highlighting and language labels
• Auto-save (300ms debounce)
• Keyboard-first: Cmd+B bold, Cmd+I italic, Cmd+K link

File Management

• Open multiple folders as roots — no vault lock-in, just your filesystem
• Recursive file tree with expand/collapse
• Full-text search powered by SQLite FTS5
• Tag system: YAML frontmatter + inline #hashtags
• Quick file open with Cmd+P

Design

• Dark-first, sharp & modern (Inku Dark + Inku Light included)
• Themeable via small JSON files — just color tokens, no CSS
• Clean typography — geometric sans for UI, monospace for code
• 4px grid, subtle borders, no shadows

Extensible

• Built-in plugins: GFM, Math/KaTeX, Mermaid, Footnotes
• Plugin architecture: drop a folder in ~/.inku/plugins/
• Community themes: drop a JSON file in ~/.inku/themes/

Quick Start

git clone https://github.com/Piryus/inku.git
cd inku
npm install
npx electron-rebuild -f -w better-sqlite3
npm run build:main

Then, in two terminals:

# Terminal 1 — Vite dev server
npm run dev

# Terminal 2 — Electron
NODE_ENV=development npx electron .

Keyboard Shortcuts

Shortcut	Action
Cmd+P	Quick file open
Cmd+Shift+P	Command palette
Cmd+\	Toggle sidebar
Cmd+,	Settings
Cmd+N	New file
Cmd+B	Bold
Cmd+I	Italic
Cmd+K	Insert link
Cmd+S	Save

Architecture

Electron Main Process
├── SQLite (better-sqlite3) — file index, tags, FTS5 search
├── File Watcher (chokidar) — watches roots, syncs to DB
├── Plugin Loader — discovers and validates plugins
└── Typed IPC Handlers

Electron Renderer Process (web-portable)
├── React 18 + Zustand
├── CodeMirror 6 — inline markdown rendering
├── Theme Engine — CSS custom properties from JSON tokens
└── Sidebar, Tabs, Command Palette, Settings

The renderer never touches Node APIs. All system access goes through typed IPC channels, making the web port straightforward.

Themes

Themes are small JSON files with color tokens:

{
  "name": "My Theme",
  "author": "you",
  "colors": {
    "bg-primary": "#0a0a0b",
    "bg-secondary": "#111113",
    "accent": "#c4b5fd",
    ...
  }
}

Drop it in ~/.inku/themes/ and select it in Settings.

Plugins

Built-in plugins ship enabled by default. Toggle them in Settings.

Plugin	What it does
GFM	Tables, strikethrough, autolinks, task lists
Math	LaTeX rendering via KaTeX
Mermaid	Diagrams from fenced code blocks
Footnotes	Footnote references and definitions

Community plugins go in ~/.inku/plugins/. Each plugin is a folder with a manifest.json and index.js.

Tech Stack

Layer	Technology
Shell	Electron
UI	React 18, Zustand
Editor	CodeMirror 6
Database	SQLite (better-sqlite3)
File watching	chokidar
Bundler	Vite
Language	TypeScript

Roadmap

• Web version (renderer is already web-portable)
• Vim mode
• Image drag-and-drop
• Table of contents sidebar
• Export to PDF / HTML
• Plugin marketplace

License

MIT