Trilium Share – Gruvbox Blog System

A complete public-share blog system + Gruvbox theme for TriliumNext. It turns a normal Trilium note tree into a themed, searchable blog with categories, an RSS feed, a sitemap, a digital garden (growth states) and client-side rendering of Mermaid, Excalidraw and mind-map notes.

Everything is driven by Trilium's built-in Public Share feature plus a few frontend/backend scripts – no external dependencies (except highlight.js, vendored in lib/).

Palette from the morhetz/gruvbox repository.

Features

• Gruvbox light/dark theme for the share, with a theme toggle in the header.
• Blog index, category pages, sub-categories, tags and tag overview.
• Article metadata: date, category, summary, tags, prev/next navigation, reading time.
• Digital Garden: state labels (Seed → Evergreen, Draft, Review) rendered as badges and colour-coded growth tables.
• Search (client-side over a generated index), RSS feed and sitemap.xml.
• Widget rendering for Mermaid, Excalidraw (canvas) and MindElixir (mind map) notes, with a collapsible, highlighted "Source" block and copy button.
• Code highlighting (highlight.js + line numbers) and copy buttons on all code boxes.
• Optional "Buy me a coffee" button with locally-hosted Cookie font.
• blog_generator (backend) builds index/feed/sitemap/search-data; blog_publish_manager moves notes between an Unpublished staging area and the live blog.

Repository layout

Path	Content	Trilium note type / mime
blog_generator.js	backend script that generates index, feed, sitemap, search data, category & tag pages	code, application/javascript;env=backend
blog_publish_manager.js	backend script that mirrors notes between Unpublished and the blog	code, application/javascript;env=backend
theme/blog_share_theme.css	the Gruvbox share theme	code, text/css
theme/favicon.svg	default site favicon	code (SVG)
theme/cookie.woff2	"Cookie" font for the Buy me a coffee button	file, font/woff2
lib/highlight.js	vendored highlight.js	code, application/javascript
lib/hljs_line_numbers.js	highlight.js line-numbers plugin	code
scripts/*.js	frontend share snippets (content is pasted verbatim into a code note, including the <script>/<style> wrapper)	code
templates/blog_article.html	article template with promoted labels	text
examples/*	sample category logo + menu icon script (ignis8)	code / SVG
generated/*	reference output, regenerated automatically by blog_generator.js	code / xml

The file content of a scripts/* note already contains the <script> / <style> tags. When you create the code note, paste the whole file into the note content.

Prerequisites

• TriliumNext server with Public Share enabled (Options → Public access).
• A public hostname (optional but recommended, e.g. for sitemap.xml / OG tags).
• Basic familiarity with Trilium attributes (labels & relations).

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Installation

1. Create the note structure

root
└── Blog                    (book)
    ├── Richard's Blog      (book)  ← blog root, the shared note
    │   ├── .blog           (book)  ← system notes (scripts, css, data)
    │   ├── Astrophotography (book) ← example category
    │   ├── Electronic      (book)
    │   ├── Leathercraft    (book)
    │   ├── Digital Garden  (book)  ← growth-state garden category
    │   ├── Tags            (text)  ← auto-filled tag overview
    │   ├── About Me        (text)
    │   └── Impressum       (text)
    ├── Unpublished         (book)  ← staging area
    ├── blog_generator      (code, backend)
    └── blog_publish_manager (code, backend)

You can use any titles; the generator finds notes by the constants at the top of blog_generator.js (BLOG_ROOT_NOTE_ID, BLOG_SYSTEM_NOTE_ID, TAGS_SECTION_TITLE).

2. Create the code notes

Under .blog create one code note per file, using the file name as the note title (optional, but matches the generator):

Note title	File	mime
blog_share_theme.css	theme/blog_share_theme.css	text/css
favicon	theme/favicon.svg	– (SVG)
Cookie	theme/cookie.woff2	font/woff2 (file note)
highlight.js	lib/highlight.js	application/javascript
hljs line numbers plugin	lib/hljs_line_numbers.js	text/javascript
hide home title	scripts/hide_home_title.js	text/html
garden h1 green	scripts/garden_h1_green.js	text/html
table column hover	scripts/table_column_hover.js	text/html
blog card click	scripts/blog_card_click.js	text/html
garden row click	scripts/garden_row_click.js	text/html
code note highlight	scripts/code_note_highlight.js	text/html
code copy & lines	scripts/code_copy_lines.js	text/html
title state badge	scripts/title_state_badge.js	text/html
bmc button	scripts/bmc_button.js	text/html
logo share alias	scripts/logo_share_alias.js	text/html
prev next	scripts/prev_next.js	text/html
reading time	scripts/reading_time.js	text/html
search header	scripts/search_header.js	text/html
note fallback	scripts/note_fallback.js	text/html
feed.xml	generated/feed.xml	code (regenerated)
sitemap.xml	generated/sitemap.xml	code (regenerated)
state_map	generated/state_map.js	text/html (regenerated)
blog_data	generated/blog_data.js	text/html (regenerated)

Also create, under the Blog book: blog_generator (from blog_generator.js, mime application/javascript;env=backend) and blog_publish_manager (from blog_publish_manager.js, mime application/javascript;env=backend).

3. Wire the attributes

On the blog root note (Richard's Blog), add:

Attribute	Value	Inheritable
shareRoot	true	–
shareAlias	blog	–
shareIndex	(empty)	–
shareDescription	e.g. Project documentation & technical blog	–
shareOpenGraphURL	https://YOUR-INSTANCE.example.com/	–
shareOpenGraphColor	#83a598	–
iconClass	bx bx-edit-alt	–
~shareCss	→ blog_share_theme.css	yes
~shareFavicon	→ favicon	yes
~shareHtml	→ table column hover, blog card click, garden row click, code note highlight, code copy & lines, state_map, title state badge, bmc button, logo share alias, blog_data, prev next, reading time, search header, ignis8 menu icon (optional), note fallback	yes
~shareHtml	→ hide home title	no (index only)
~runOnNoteContentChange, ~runOnAttributeChange, ~runOnNoteCreation, ~runOnNoteTitleChange, ~runOnAttributeCreation, ~runOnBranchDeletion, ~runOnChildNoteCreation	→ blog_generator	yes
~runOnAttributeChange, ~runOnAttributeCreation	→ blog_publish_manager	yes

On the script notes (under .blog), add:

Note	Attribute
hide home title	shareHtmlLocation=head:end, shareHiddenFromTree
garden h1 green	shareHtmlLocation=head:end, shareHiddenFromTree
state_map	shareHtmlLocation=body:start, shareHiddenFromTree
title state badge	shareHtmlLocation=content:start, shareHiddenFromTree
every other script	shareHtmlLocation=body:end, shareHiddenFromTree
highlight.js	shareHiddenFromTree
feed.xml	shareAlias=feed, shareRaw, shareHiddenFromTree
sitemap.xml	shareAlias=sitemap.xml, shareRaw, shareHiddenFromTree
.blog (book)	shareHiddenFromTree, viewType=list

On the Digital Garden category note (and any other garden category), add:

Attribute	Value	Inheritable
blogGarden	(empty)	–
shareAlias	digital-garden	–
iconClass	bx bx-leaf	–
label:state	promoted,alias=Growth Condition,single,select,options=Seed;Seedling;Sprout;Sprouting;Bud;Evergreen;Draft;Review	yes
~shareHtml	→ garden h1 green	–

Categories: any top-level note under the blog root (that is not Tags, .blog, About Me, Impressum or Search) is treated as a category. blogGarden marks it as a growth-state garden.

4. Replace the placeholder note IDs

Trilium assigns random note IDs on creation, so the scripts that reference notes by ID contain placeholder tokens. Replace every __TOKEN__ with the real note ID of the corresponding note:

Token	Replace with note
__BLOG_ROOT_ID__	Richard's Blog
__BLOG_SYSTEM_ID__	.blog
__UNPUBLISHED_ROOT_ID__	Unpublished
__BLOG_GENERATOR_ID__	blog_generator
__HIDE_HOME_TITLE_ID__	hide home title
__HLJS_ID__	highlight.js
__HLJS_LN_ID__	hljs line numbers plugin
__COOKIE_FONT_ID__	Cookie
__TITLE_ICON_ID__	(only needed for the ignis8 example)
__CATEGORY_NOTE_ID__	(only needed for the ignis8 example)

Then edit the constants at the top of blog_generator.js and blog_publish_manager.js:

• BLOG_ROOT_NOTE_ID / BLOG_ROOT_ID → the blog root note ID
• BLOG_SYSTEM_NOTE_ID → the .blog note ID
• UNPUBLISHED_ROOT_ID → the Unpublished note ID
• BLOG_GENERATOR_ID → the generator note ID
• SHARE_BASE → your public base URL, e.g. https://YOUR-INSTANCE.example.com
• SITE_TITLE, SITE_DESCRIPTION → your blog name/tagline

5. Enable Public Share and generate

1. On Richard's Blog right-click → Share → enable sharing.
2. Run the generator once: execute the blog_generator script (e.g. press play in the script editor, or trigger any attribute/content change). It is also wired to run automatically on every relevant change (runOn*), and you can add run=daily to it for a nightly run.
3. Open the share (options → Public access → URL) – the blog index is generated at the share root.

6. Publish an article

1. Create a note from the templates/blog_article.html content (or clone the template note). It promotes the publish, date, category, summary, shareAlias and tags labels.
2. Put it under a category inside Richard's Blog and set publish=true.
3. To keep it private, put it under Unpublished instead – blog_publish_manager clones it into the matching category (and back) when you flip publish.

7. Optional: clean hostname via nginx

If you want a clean domain instead of /share, proxy it and rewrite / to /share/:

server {
    server_name blog.example.com;
    location / {
        proxy_pass https://notes.example.com/share/;
        proxy_set_header Host notes.example.com;
    }
}

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How the generator works

• Walks the blog root and collects notes with publish=true.
• Writes the index (article cards), category pages (sub-category chips + articles, respecting a <!-- blog:articles --> marker so your hand-written intro text is kept), tag pages and the tags overview.
• Regenerates feed.xml (RSS), sitemap.xml, state_map (garden states) and blog_data (search index used by the header search + prev/next).
• Sets shareDescription on every published note from its summary.

Customisation

• Theme: edit theme/blog_share_theme.css (Gruvbox light/dark via html.theme-light/dark).
• Buy me a coffee: edit scripts/bmc_button.js (link, text, copyright) – the font is referenced via __COOKIE_FONT_ID__.
• Category logos: copy the examples/ icon + ignis8_menu_icon.js pattern to give a category a custom menu icon and title logo.

Acknowledgements

This theme and blog system was created with the help of Opencode and Deepseek V4 Flash.

License

The vendored highlight.js is licensed under BSD-3-Clause (see its header). All other files in this repository are provided as-is – see the original author's repository for details.