LiveMD

Live file viewer with syntax highlighting, powered by CLI file watching.

Problem

Reading markdown in the terminal is painful - no formatting, code blocks are plain text, tables are unreadable. When AI agents generate markdown files, you want to see them properly rendered.

Solution

LiveMD runs as a persistent server. Add markdown files to watch from the CLI, see them rendered in your browser with live updates.

Terminal                              Browser (localhost:3000)
────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
$ livemd start                    →   Server started

$ livemd add README.md            →   Sidebar shows README.md
                                      Content rendered on right

$ livemd add docs/guide.md        →   Two files in sidebar
                                      Click to switch

[edit README.md]                  →   Browser updates live

Install

# Clone and build
git clone https://github.com/erkantaylan/live-md.git
cd live-md
make build

# Optional: install globally
make install

Usage

# Start the server
livemd start

# Add files to watch
livemd add README.md
livemd add docs/guide.md

# Add entire folder recursively
livemd add ./docs -r
livemd add ./src -r --filter "md,go,js"

# List watched files
livemd list

# Remove a file
livemd remove README.md

# Stop the server
livemd stop

Open http://localhost:3000 in your browser.

Make Commands

make              Show help
make build        Build the binary
make clean        Remove binary

make install      Install to /usr/local/bin (sudo)
make install-user Install to ~/.local/bin (no sudo)
make uninstall    Remove from /usr/local/bin
make uninstall-user Remove from ~/.local/bin
make update       Pull latest and rebuild

make start        Start the server (foreground)
make stop         Stop the server
make daemon       Start as background daemon
make daemon-stop  Stop background daemon

make watch f1 f2      Add files to watch
make watch-dir ./dir  Add folder recursively
make unwatch f1       Remove files from watch
make list             List watched files

Features

• Persistent server - Start once, add files anytime
• Tree view sidebar - Collapsible folder structure like a solution explorer
• Lazy watching - Files are registered but only actively watched when selected (saves system resources)
• Recursive folder watching - Add entire directories with livemd add ./folder -r
• WebSocket live updates - No page refresh needed
• GitHub-flavored markdown - Tables, task lists, autolinks
• Syntax highlighting - Code blocks in markdown and standalone code files (50+ languages)
• Network access - Shows all network interface IPs on startup for easy access from other devices
• Cross-platform - Works on Linux, macOS, Windows

Tech Stack

• Go single binary (~15MB)
• goldmark for markdown parsing
• chroma for syntax highlighting
• fsnotify for file watching
• gorilla/websocket for live updates