Getting Started

Get MarkDocs running locally in under 5 minutes.

Prerequisites

Docker and Docker Compose
Or: Node.js 18+ and PostgreSQL (for running without Docker)

Option A: Docker Compose (Recommended)


git clone https://github.com/thakurkharel/markdocs.git
cd markdocs
cp .env.example .env
docker compose up -d

This starts:

PostgreSQL on port 5432
MarkDocs app on port 3001

Open http://localhost:3001 .

Option B: Local Development

If you prefer running Next.js directly:


git clone https://github.com/thakurkharel/markdocs.git
cd markdocs
 
# Start just the database
docker compose up -d db
 
# Install dependencies and set up the database
npm install
npx prisma db push
 
# Start the dev server
npm run dev

The app runs on http://localhost:3001 .

Create Your Account

From the browser:

Navigate to the app
Click Sign Up
Choose a handle (e.g. @yourname) and password

Or from the CLI:


curl -fsSL https://markdocs.sh/install.sh | bash
markdocs signup --url http://localhost:3001 --handle yourname
markdocs setup

Invite Others

MarkDocs uses invite links to add new users:

Go to Settings
Click Create Invite
Share the invite link with your team
They sign up using the invite code

Environment Variables

Variable	Default	Description
`DATABASE_URL`	—	PostgreSQL connection string
`DIRECT_URL`	—	Direct PostgreSQL URL (for Prisma)
`JWT_SECRET`	`change-me-to-a-random-secret`	Secret for signing auth tokens
`PORT`	`3001`	App port
`POSTGRES_PASSWORD`	`markdocs`	Database password (Docker only)

Next Steps

Generate an API key for the CLI and MCP server
Set up the MCP server to connect AI agents
Deploy to production