§ Getting Started

From zero to a live
InkCMS site in an afternoon.

Download, install, edit, ship. Use the tooling you already use — VS Code, Claude Code, your favorite hosting. We don't run your site. You do.

§ At a glance

A normal .NET app. Your machine. Your hosting.

InkCMS isn't a SaaS. It's an ASP.NET Core application you download as a .zip, unzip somewhere on your machine, and run. The content lives on disk as Markdown. The admin runs on the same .NET host as the public site. You edit content in the browser, in VS Code, in Claude Code, or all three at once — whichever fits the moment.

When you're ready to ship, you copy the install folder to your hosting. That's it. No control plane, no platform team, no vendor lock-in. We have your license key on file; you have the bits.

§ The four steps

Install, edit, preview, ship.

Sign up + get your key

Create an account at /signup. Pick a plan. We email you an install key (looks like ICMS-xxx…) and link to the installer.

Download + install

Grab the Windows or Mac .zip from your subscription downloads. Unzip. Run Install.ps1 (Win) or install.sh (Mac). Pick a folder. Done.

Edit your way

Browser-side admin at /administer. VS Code for files on disk. Claude Code if you want an agent making the changes. All three see the same content tree.

Ship to your hosting

Azure App Service, IIS, Linux + Kestrel — anywhere .NET runs. Copy the /config and /content folder up. Publish the source files Done.

§ Edit with VS Code

Your familiar editor. Real files. Live preview.

InkCMS pages are Markdown files with YAML frontmatter. Open the install folder in VS Code, edit content/production/about/index.md, save, refresh the browser. That's the loop. No build step, no static-site generator, no deployment dance — the dev server picks up the change.

Use whatever Markdown extensions you already love. Git the whole thing. Branch and merge content the same way you branch and merge code. InkCMS doesn't care.

content/
├── production/
│   ├── index.md           → /
│   ├── about/index.md     → /about
│   └── news/
│       ├── index.md       → /news
│       └── spring/
│           └── index.md   → /news/spring
├── menus/
│   ├── main.md
│   └── footer.md
└── media/
    └── hero.jpg + hero.jpg.md

$ claude "rewrite the About page hero
  to lead with our hosting story, not
  the founder bio"

✓ Read about/index.md
✓ Restructured hero section
✓ Saved staging draft
✓ Updated meta description

Ready for review at /about?cache=0

§ Edit with Claude Code

Or just describe the change. Claude does it.

Install Claude Code in your terminal, point it at your InkCMS install folder, and tell it what you want changed. It reads the same Markdown files VS Code does, makes the edits, saves them to staging. You review in the browser, publish when ready.

Not just typo fixes — restructure pages, rewrite for a new audience, add sections, generate alt text for every image in the media library, audit your AI prompts. The full content tree is its sandbox.

§ Hosting

Run it where you run anything else.

Azure App Service

Easiest if you're already in Azure. Windows or Linux App Service plans both work. Web Deploy from the install folder, or zip-deploy via the CLI. Custom domain + SSL through Azure's portal.

B1 starter plan ($13/mo) is enough for most marketing sites; scale up when traffic warrants.

Self-hosted IIS

Your own Windows Server box. Install the .NET hosting bundle, drop the folder under C:\inetpub\, point IIS at it. Standard ASP.NET Core IIS configuration.

No InkCMS-specific IIS modules needed.

Linux + Kestrel

Ubuntu, Debian, RHEL — any Linux that runs .NET 10. Run Kestrel directly behind Nginx or Caddy as a reverse proxy. Systemd unit, file. Done.

DigitalOcean, Hetzner, Linode all work fine.

You own the hosting relationship. The hosting account is in your name. The DNS is in your name. The SSL cert is in your name. We don't have admin access to your hosting and we don't want it. If you ever decide to leave InkCMS, you keep the bits and the content; we just stop billing you.

§ What we don't do

No platform lock-in. No hostage situations.

We don't host your site.
We don't own your domain.
We don't see your customers' data.
We don't push updates to your install without you initiating them.
We don't have a "platform" you have to migrate off of when you leave.

Your license stops working if you let it expire — that's the only thing tying you to us. The site keeps running for 30 days past expiration, then publishing pauses. Content stays where it always was: on your hosting, in your install folder.

§ Need a hand?

Two ways we can help.

§ Hire a partner

Work with a trained InkCMS developer.

Web shops who already know the stack. They build the site, hand it over, you own the keys. We connect you with one who fits your scope and budget.

Find a partner →

§ We do it for you

Have InkCMS migrate your site.

We'll take your current site — WordPress, Squarespace, custom — and stand it up on InkCMS. Tune-up, styling refresh, hosting setup. Still your hosting, still your keys.

Have us migrate you →

From zero to a liveInkCMS site in an afternoon.