bengal 0.2.6

Python static site generator for documentation, blogs, and product sites

ᓚᘏᗢ Bengal

A Python static site generator for documentation, blogs, and product sites

pip install bengal
bengal new site mysite && cd mysite && bengal serve

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What is Bengal?

Bengal is a Python static site generator for documentation sites, blogs, knowledge bases, and product sites. It focuses on fast builds, strong defaults, and discovery-friendly output: sitemaps, feeds, canonical URLs, Open Graph tags, social cards, search indexes, and JSON/LLM exports.

Why people pick it:

• Search-friendly output — Sitemap, RSS, canonical URLs, Open Graph tags, social cards, Content Signals
• Fast builds — Parallel builds, incremental rebuilds, Zstandard-compressed caching
• Modern Python — Python 3.14+ with free-threading support, fully typed
• Content workflows — Native Jupyter .ipynb rendering, Binder/Colab links
• Batteries included — Auto-generated API docs, content validation, site analysis
• Extensible — Pluggable engines for templates, Markdown, and syntax highlighting

Use Bengal For

• Documentation sites — Versioned docs, API reference, search, and internal linking
• Blogs and journals — Tags, categories, feeds, related content, and social sharing
• Knowledge bases — Markdown-first publishing with validation and JSON search indexes
• Product and marketing sites — Landing pages, content collections, and social cards

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Quick Commands

Command	Description
bengal build	Production build
bengal serve	Dev server with live reload
bengal validate	Health checks and validation
bengal fix	Auto-fix common issues
bengal graph report	Site structure analysis

Aliases: b (build), s (serve), v (validate)

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Site Scaffolding

Interactive Wizard — Guided setup with presets

Run without arguments for a guided experience:

bengal new site

The wizard prompts for site name, base URL, and presents preset options:

🎯 What kind of site are you building?
  📝 Blog            - Personal or professional blog
  📚 Documentation   - Technical docs or guides
  💼 Portfolio       - Showcase your work
  🛒 Product         - Product site with listings and features
  📄 Resume          - Professional resume/CV site
  📦 Blank           - Empty site, no initial structure
  ⚙️  Custom         - Define your own structure

Each preset creates a complete site with appropriate sections, sample content, and configuration.

Direct Template Selection — Skip prompts with explicit options

Create sites non-interactively with --template:

bengal new site my-docs --template docs
bengal new site my-blog --template blog
bengal new site portfolio --template portfolio

Available templates:

Template	Description	Sections Created
default	Basic site structure	Home page only
blog	Personal/professional blog	blog, about
docs	Technical documentation	getting-started, guides, reference
portfolio	Showcase work	about, projects, blog, contact
product	Product site with listings	products, features, pricing, contact
resume	Professional CV	Single resume page
landing	Single-page landing	Home, privacy, terms
changelog	Release notes timeline	Changelog with versions

Add Sections to Existing Sites — Expand without recreating

Add new content sections to an existing Bengal site:

# Add multiple sections
bengal init --sections docs --sections tutorials

# Add sections with sample content
bengal init --sections blog --with-content --pages-per-section 5

# Preview without creating files
bengal init --sections api --dry-run

Section type inference:

Name Pattern	Inferred Type	Behavior
blog, posts, articles, news	blog	Date-sorted, post-style
docs, documentation, guides, tutorials	doc	Weight-sorted, doc-style
projects, portfolio	section	Standard section
about, contact	section	Standard section

Custom Skeleton Manifests — YAML-defined site structures

For complex or repeatable scaffolding, define structures in YAML manifests:

# Preview what would be created
bengal project skeleton apply my-structure.yaml --dry-run

# Apply the skeleton
bengal project skeleton apply my-structure.yaml

# Overwrite existing files
bengal project skeleton apply my-structure.yaml --force

Example manifest (docs-skeleton.yaml):

name: Documentation Site
description: Technical docs with navigation sections
version: "1.0"

cascade:
  type: doc  # Applied to all pages

structure:
  - path: _index.md
    props:
      title: Documentation
      description: Project documentation
      weight: 100
    content: |
      # Documentation
      Welcome! Start with our [Quick Start](getting-started/quickstart/).

  - path: getting-started/_index.md
    props:
      title: Getting Started
      weight: 10
    cascade:
      type: doc
    pages:
      - path: installation.md
        props:
          title: Installation
          weight: 20
        content: |
          # Installation
          ```bash
          pip install your-package
          ```

      - path: quickstart.md
        props:
          title: Quick Start
          weight: 30
        content: |
          # Quick Start
          Your first project in 5 minutes.

  - path: api/_index.md
    props:
      title: API Reference
      weight: 30
    content: |
      # API Reference
      Complete API documentation.

Component Model:

• path — File or directory path
• type — Component identity (blog, doc, landing)
• variant — Visual style variant
• props — Frontmatter data (title, weight, etc.)
• content — Markdown body content
• pages — Child components (makes this a section)
• cascade — Values inherited by all descendants

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Features

Feature	Description	Docs
SEO & Discovery	Sitemap, RSS, canonical URLs, Open Graph, social cards, search, JSON/LLM output, llms.txt, Content Signals	SEO & Discovery →
Directives	Tabs, admonitions, cards, dropdowns, code blocks	Content →
Notebooks	Native Jupyter .ipynb rendering, Binder/Colab links	Notebooks →
Autodoc	Generate API docs from Python, CLI, OpenAPI	Autodoc →
Remote Sources	Pull content from GitHub, Notion, REST APIs	Sources →
Image Processing	Resize, crop, format conversion (WebP/AVIF), srcset generation	Images →
Content Collections	Type-safe frontmatter with dataclass/Pydantic schemas	Collections →
Theming	Dark mode, responsive, syntax highlighting, search	Theming →
Validation	Health checks, broken link detection, auto-fix	Building →
Performance	Parallel builds, incremental rebuilds, streaming	Large Sites →
Zero-Config Deploy	Auto-detects GitHub Pages, Netlify, Vercel	Deployment →

📚 Full documentation: lbliii.github.io/bengal

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Configuration

Single-file — Simple projects

# bengal.toml
[site]
title = "My Site"
baseurl = "https://example.com"

Directory-based — Multi-environment projects

config/
├── _default/           # Base configuration
│   ├── site.yaml
│   └── build.yaml
├── environments/       # Environment overrides
│   └── production.yaml
└── profiles/           # Build profiles
    └── dev.yaml

bengal build -e production    # Production environment
bengal build --profile dev    # Development profile

📖 Configuration guide: Configuration →

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Project Structure

mysite/
├── content/          # Markdown pages
├── templates/        # Custom templates (optional)
├── assets/           # Static files (CSS, JS, images)
├── data/             # YAML/JSON data files
├── config/           # Configuration directory
└── public/           # Build output

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Theming

Bengal ships with a modern, accessible default theme:

• Dark mode with system preference detection
• Responsive design with mobile navigation
• Syntax highlighting with copy buttons
• Table of contents with scroll spy
• Full-text search (Lunr.js)

Customize templates:

{# templates/page.html #}
{% extends "base.html" %}

{% block content %}
<article class="prose">
  <h1>{{ page.title }}</h1>
  {{ content | safe }}
</article>
{% endblock %}

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Pluggable Engines

Bengal follows a "bring your own" pattern — swap engines without changing your content.

Template Engine

Engine	Description	Install
Kida	Bengal's native engine. AST-native, free-threading safe, Jinja2-compatible syntax	Built-in

Kida is the built-in template engine. It uses Jinja2-compatible syntax, so existing Jinja2 templates generally work without changes. See the Kida migration guide if migrating from Jinja2.

Markdown Parsers

Parser	Description	Install
Patitas (default)	Bengal's native parser. Typed AST, O(n) parsing, thread-safe	Built-in
Mistune	Fast, modern parser	Built-in
Python-Markdown	Full-featured, extensive extensions	Built-in

# config/_default/content.yaml
markdown:
  parser: patitas  # default, or mistune (legacy), python-markdown

Syntax Highlighters

Backend	Description	Install
Rosettes (default)	Lock-free, 55+ languages, O(n) guaranteed	pip install rosettes

# config/_default/theme.yaml
highlighting:
  backend: rosettes

Custom backends can be registered via register_backend().

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Requirements

• Python 3.14+ (uses free-threading and PEP 784 compression)
• Linux, macOS, Windows

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Philosophy

Bengal prioritizes correctness and clarity over backwards compatibility.

Each release represents the best solution we know how to deliver. When existing behavior no longer reflects the best design, it changes. Upgrades may require reading release notes and making adjustments.

• Fail loudly — Breaking changes produce clear errors
• User control — You choose when to upgrade; we choose what changes
• No hidden layers — No compatibility shims or deprecated code paths

If you need multi-year stability, pin your version.

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Documentation

📚 lbliii.github.io/bengal

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Development

git clone https://github.com/lbliii/bengal.git
cd bengal
uv sync --group dev
pytest

Multi-repo workspace: With bengal, patitas, rosettes, etc. as siblings, copy workspace-root.example/pyproject.toml to the parent directory and run uv sync from there. The workspace root overrides sources so all packages use local versions. CI and end users (no workspace root) use PyPI.

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The Bengal Ecosystem

A structured reactive stack — every layer written in pure Python for 3.14t free-threading.

ᓚᘏᗢ	Bengal	Static site generator ← You are here	Docs
∿∿	Purr	Content runtime	—
⌁⌁	Chirp	Web framework	Docs
=^..^=	Pounce	ASGI server	Docs
)彡	Kida	Template engine	Docs
ฅᨐฅ	Patitas	Markdown parser	Docs
⌾⌾⌾	Rosettes	Syntax highlighter	Docs

Python-native. Free-threading ready. No npm required.

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License

MIT