Installation

Starting with the next release, install the latest prebuilt CLI on Linux or macOS with:

curl --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 -LsSf https://diplodocus.cc/install | sh

This script downloads and runs the latest release's cargo-dist installer. It installs the executable in Cargo's binary directory, normally ~/.cargo/bin. Language runtimes and package dependencies must be installed separately.

On Windows, run this in PowerShell:

irm https://diplodocus.cc/install.ps1 | iex

You can also build the CLI from a source checkout with the pinned Rust toolchain and dependencies:

git clone https://github.com/jolars/diplodocus.git
cd diplodocus
devenv shell
cargo build --locked --bin diplodocus
cargo run --locked -- --help

The devenv shell also provides Python, R, Julia, Jupyter kernels, browser tools, and a separate pinned nightly Rust documentation toolchain used by the project examples and tests. A workspace that only contains Markdown does not need these language runtimes. Rust extraction requires the prepared documentation toolchain, Cargo.lock, and cached dependencies; see Rust extraction. R API extraction requires R on PATH and installed dependencies for package-wide imports. Rd examples additionally require pkgload, evaluate, a loadable checkout with prebuilt extensions, and the dependencies used by those examples. Extraction loads that checkout and executes its examples. Generating a site from an exported snapshot needs none of these runtimes. Executable QMD pages need the selected Jupyter kernel already installed and discoverable. Diplodocus never installs a workspace's dependencies or kernels.

After the crate is published, cargo install diplodocus --locked will install the CLI from crates.io. Until then, run it with cargo run --locked -- from this checkout, or invoke the compiled binary at target/debug/diplodocus.

GitHub Actions

Use setup-diplodocus to install and cache the prebuilt CLI in CI. After checking out your project and preparing its language runtimes and dependencies, run:

- uses: jolars/setup-diplodocus@v0
  with:
    version: "0.4.0"
- run: diplodocus build

The action accepts an exact CLI version with or without v, or latest. Pin an exact version for reproducible builds. The action version is independent of the CLI version, and your workflow controls the build commands and output.

Continue with the quick start.