Getting started

Installation

One line to get the CLI, and the three other ways in case that line is not for you.

The install script#

sh
curl -fsSL https://pridont.github.io/slide/install.sh | sh

It resolves the latest GitHub release, downloads the npm tarball attached to it, and installs that globally with npm. Then it runs slide --version and tells you if the binary is not on your PATH.

Piping a script into a shell is worth reading first. It is one file, about a hundred lines, and it only ever calls curl, npm and node:

sh
curl -fsSL https://pridont.github.io/slide/install.sh | less

Requirements#

Options#

The script reads three environment variables:

sh
# A specific release rather than the latest
curl -fsSL https://pridont.github.io/slide/install.sh | SLIDE_VERSION=v0.2.0 sh

# Your own fork
curl -fsSL https://pridont.github.io/slide/install.sh | SLIDE_REPO=you/slide sh

# A private repository
curl -fsSL https://pridont.github.io/slide/install.sh | GITHUB_TOKEN=ghp_… sh

npm, without the script#

The release asset is an ordinary npm tarball, so npm can install it straight from its URL — no script involved:

sh
npm install -g https://github.com/pridont/slide/releases/latest/download/slide.tgz

As a project dependency#

A deck kept in a repository is usually better off with the CLI pinned beside it, so everyone who checks it out builds it with the same version:

sh
npm install -D https://github.com/pridont/slide/releases/download/v0.2.0/slide-0.2.0.tgz
npx slide build slides/

This is also what a project using a TypeScript config wants, because slide.config.ts imports its types from the package:

ts
import type { ProjectConfig } from 'slide'

From source#

sh
git clone https://github.com/pridont/slide.git
cd slide
pnpm install
pnpm build
npm install -g .        # or: node dist/cli/index.js build talk.md

pnpm is what the repository uses; npm install works too.

Diagrams need two more things#

Nothing above installs mermaid or a browser, and a deck without a ```mermaid fence never wants either. A deck with one needs both, in the project it is built from:

sh
pnpm add -D mermaid playwright && pnpm exec playwright install chromium

They are optional peer dependencies. A deck that has a fence and neither installed gets an error naming this line, rather than a diagram that quietly renders differently somewhere else. See Diagrams.

Updating#

Run the install script again — it always resolves the latest release:

sh
curl -fsSL https://pridont.github.io/slide/install.sh | sh

Uninstalling#

sh
npm uninstall -g slide

When it does not work#

slide: command not found after a successful install. npm's global bin directory is not on your PATH. The script prints the exact directory; add it to your shell profile:

sh
export PATH="$(npm prefix -g)/bin:$PATH"

npm cannot write to /usr/local. The global prefix is owned by root. Either install with sudo -E sh — -E so SLIDE_VERSION and friends survive — or, better, point npm somewhere you own and never need sudo again:

sh
npm config set prefix ~/.local
export PATH="$HOME/.local/bin:$PATH"

has no published releases yet. There is no release to install from. Use from source until there is one.