www.loicb.dev

Personal portfolio and blog. Built with ClojureScript, Replicant, and shadow-cljs.

Static SPA — no server. Blog content is embedded at compile time. Deployed to Netlify.

Stack

Layer	Technology
UI	Replicant (hiccup-based, no virtual DOM)
Build	shadow-cljs via Babashka tasks
Markdown	marked + highlight.js (browser-side)
Validation	Malli (compile-time schema checks)
RSS	commonmark-java + clj-rss
Config	EDN (clj-yaml for frontmatter)
Hosting	Netlify with Image CDN

Prerequisites

• Java 21+
• Clojure CLI
• Babashka
• Node.js 18+

Development

bb dev

This starts an nREPL with shadow-cljs middleware. Connect your editor, then in the REPL:

(start!)        ; starts shadow-cljs server + watches :app build
                ; dev server at http://localhost:3000

Other REPL helpers: (stop!), (cljs-repl!), :cljs/quit.

For a standalone dev server without REPL:

bb watch        ; shadow-cljs watch on port 3000

Content

Blog posts are markdown files with YAML frontmatter in content/blog/. Media (images) lives in content/media/.

Importing from Obsidian

bb import-notes /path/to/vault/Articles

The articles directory should contain:

• blog/ — markdown files with YAML frontmatter
• media/ (optional) — images referenced by posts

The import normalizes Obsidian-flavored markdown: converts [[wiki links]] to standard web links, rewrites relative media paths, and strips vault-internal sections.

Frontmatter format

---
date: 2026-02-20
tags:
  - clojure
  - architecture
rss-feeds:
  - clojure
  - all
repos:
  - [repo-name, "https://github.com/..."]
---

The filename becomes the post title and URL slug (e.g. Getting Started with Replicant.md becomes /blog/getting-started-with-replicant).

Testing

bb test

Uses Rich Comment Tests (RCT). All source files are .cljc so tests run on the JVM without a browser.

Build & Deploy

bb dist

Produces a dist/ directory with all static files:

• index.html with cache-busted JS reference
• Optimized JS bundle (:advanced compilation)
• CSS, media assets, RSS feeds

Deploy pipeline

bb dist runs: bb build (shadow-cljs release + asset copy) -> bb rss (feed generation) -> static file assembly.

Netlify serves the dist/ directory. Config in netlify.toml handles SPA routing (fallback to index.html) and Image CDN optimization for media.

Project Structure

config.edn                    Site metadata, RSS feed config
build.clj                     tools.build entry point
bb.edn                        Babashka task definitions
shadow-cljs.edn               shadow-cljs build config
netlify.toml                  Netlify deploy + image CDN config

content/
├── blog/                     Markdown posts (YAML frontmatter)
└── media/                    Images referenced by posts

src/loicb/me/
├── config.clj                Reads config.edn, provides site-config macro
├── build/
│   ├── md.clj                Post loader, posts-data macro, Malli schema
│   ├── rss.clj               RSS feed generator
│   └── import.clj            Obsidian markdown normalization
└── ui/
    ├── core.cljc             Entry point, dispatch-of, rendering
    └── core/
        ├── db.cljc           Pure state updaters (db -> db)
        ├── history.cljc      URL routing (state <-> path)
        └── views.cljc        Replicant components (defalias)

dev/
└── user.clj                  REPL helpers

All Tasks

Task	Description
bb dev	Start nREPL with shadow-cljs middleware
bb watch	Start shadow-cljs dev server (standalone)
bb test	Run RCT tests on JVM
bb import-notes <dir>	Import articles from Obsidian vault
bb copy-assets	Copy media to public serving directory
bb build	Compile optimized JS bundle
bb rss	Generate RSS feeds
bb dist	Full production build
bb clean	Remove all build artifacts
bb fmt-check	Check code formatting
bb fmt-fix	Fix code formatting
bb outdated	Show outdated dependencies

License

See LICENSE.