Getting started

Validate your Astro project, download Solo after purchase, and generate your first render pack in a few minutes.

Prerequisites

• Node.js 18 or later
• An Astro project (see the Solo contract for compatibility requirements)
• A Frontmatter Solo license — get Solo for $49

Step 1 — Validate your project for free

Before buying or downloading Solo, validate that your Astro project meets the Solo contract:

npx @withfrontmatter/solo-check --root .

If the validator exits 0, your project is ready for Solo. If it exits 1, fix the reported errors first. See the error codes reference for details on each diagnostic.

Step 2 — Purchase and download Solo

After purchase, you'll receive your downloads via Polar.

There are two package types:

• frontmatter-solo/ — the CLI package for terminal usage
• Frontmatter Solo_*.dmg — the macOS desktop app for users who prefer a UI

The CLI package contains the bundled Solo runtime:

frontmatter-solo/
├─ bin/
├─ dist/
├─ starter-solo/
├─ README_SOLO.md
└─ VERSION

Run the packaged CLI directly:

./bin/frontmatter solo:validate --root ./starter-solo

If you want to call frontmatter without the ./bin/ prefix, add the package bin/ directory to your PATH:

export PATH="$PWD/bin:$PATH"
frontmatter solo:validate --root ./starter-solo

The desktop app uses the same bundled Solo runtime, but wraps it in a local UI. The current desktop build targets macOS 12+ on Apple Silicon.

xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine "/Applications/Frontmatter Solo.app"

✓ Command copied

Step 3 — Validate with the paid CLI

The bundled Solo CLI runs the same validation contract as solo-check:

./bin/frontmatter solo:validate --root ./your-project

You can also display the built-in AI workflow guide:

./bin/frontmatter solo:validate --help-ai

Step 4 — Generate the render pack

Run the build with your chosen adapter:

# Twig output (Symfony, Drupal, Craft)
./bin/frontmatter solo:build --adapter twig

# PHP output (WordPress, custom CMS)
./bin/frontmatter solo:build --adapter php

By default, output goes to ./output. Specify a different path with --out:

./bin/frontmatter solo:build --adapter twig --out ./render-pack

Step 5 — Review the output

After a successful build, your output directory contains:

output/
├─ pages/
├─ layouts/
├─ partials/
├─ manifest.json
├─ INTEGRATION.md
├─ frontmatter.build.json
└─ preview-php/           ← only with --emit-preview

Open INTEGRATION.md first — it documents every variable expected by every template, organized by page. This is the file you hand to your backend developer.

Step 6 — Preview locally (optional)

Add --emit-preview to generate a local PHP preview of the output:

./bin/frontmatter solo:build --adapter twig --emit-preview

The preview is dev-only and not intended for production. It demonstrates the template structure with stub data.

Exit codes