Guides

Frontmatter

Nizel extracts a leading frontmatter block before template rendering and Markdown parsing.

Syntax

Use --- delimiters at the very start of the Markdown:

---
title: My Page
description: A description of this page
author: silvandiepen
tags:
  - markdown
  - parser
---

# My Page

Content starts here.

Extraction

When frontmatter: true (the default), Nizel:

1. Detects the leading --- block
2. Parses the content between delimiters as YAML
3. Removes the frontmatter from the Markdown body
4. Stores the result in meta and frontmatter

Accessing Metadata

const { meta } = await nizel(`
---
title: Hello
count: 42
---
Content.
`);

// meta.title === 'Hello'
// meta.count === 42

Template Variables in Frontmatter

Frontmatter values support template expressions:

---
title: ""
slug: ""
---

Template expressions in frontmatter values are resolved after the YAML is parsed, using the provided variables and data.

Frontmatter values are also available as top-level template variables in the Markdown body. This is useful for legal or policy documents where the same entity names repeat throughout the text:

---
entityName: Henk
documentName: "{{ entityName }} service agreement"
---

# 

This agreement is between {{ entityName }} and the customer.

The same values remain available through {{ frontmatter.entityName }} and {{ meta.entityName }}. Explicit data or variables passed to Nizel override same-name frontmatter variables in body templates.

Derived Fields

Nizel can derive fields from the content when they are not in frontmatter:

• title — first heading text
• description — first paragraph text
• excerpt — truncated content summary

Options