Everything you need to run Inkwell.

Overview

Inkwell is a free, open-source, self-hosted blogging platform built on .NET 10. It ships as a single ASP.NET Core binary — no Node, no PHP, no external build pipeline. Install it on any server you control, point a domain at it, and write.

Core concepts

• Tenants — one Inkwell install can host many blogs. Each tenant has its own domain, Layout, Preset, authors, and database schema.
• Layouts — structural templates: Magazine, Grid, Minimal, Neutral, Classic, Modern.
• Presets — ten surface styles (colour palette + type scale), swappable without touching content.
• Editor — a full WYSIWYG editor: compose visually, draft, schedule, autosave, and publish.

Requirements

Installation

1. Clone the repository

$ git clone https://github.com/marutisoftwaresolutions/inkwell
$ cd inkwell

2. Restore packages

$ dotnet restore

3. Configure (see Configuration)

Edit appsettings.json or use environment variables for secrets.

4. Run database migrations

$ dotnet ef database update

5. Run

$ dotnet run --configuration Release

Quick start

Prefer a fast path? These three commands get you to a running instance with SQL Server LocalDB and a default tenant:

$ git clone https://github.com/marutisoftwaresolutions/inkwell && cd inkwell
$ dotnet ef database update
$ dotnet run

Open http://localhost:5000 and sign in with the credentials printed to the console on first boot.

Configuration

All settings live in appsettings.json. Override any value with an environment variable using the double-underscore convention: Inkwell__Tenants__0__Host.

Root structure

{
  "Inkwell": {
    "Tenants": [ ... ],
    "Database": { ... },
    "Email": { ... }
  }
}

Multi-tenant setup

{
  "Inkwell": {
    "Tenants": [
      {
        "Host": "essays.example.com",
        "Layout": "Magazine",
        "Preset": "01"
      },
      {
        "Host": "notes.example.com",
        "Layout": "Minimal",
        "Preset": "03"
      }
    ]
  }
}

Database

Inkwell runs on Microsoft SQL Server — SQL Server 2019 or later in production, or SQL Server LocalDB for local development.

{
  "Inkwell": {
    "Database": {
      "Provider": "SqlServer",
      "ConnectionString": "Server=localhost;Database=inkwell;User Id=sa;Password=Your_strong_Pass123;TrustServerCertificate=True"
    }
  }
}

Email (SMTP)

Layouts & Presets

Inkwell separates structure (Layout) from surface (Preset). Pick one of each per tenant. Swap them without a rebuild or a migration.

Layouts

Presets

Inkwell ships ten colour Presets. Each Preset is a single CSS-variable block — palette, type scale, spacing, and dark-mode adaptation — and any Preset pairs with any Layout. Swap one at any time without touching your content.

Custom themes

A Layout is a set of Razor partials in /Views/Layouts/{Name}/. A Preset is a CSS variable override block in /wwwroot/css/presets/{name}.css. Both are hot-reloaded in development. See the GitHub repository for a full theming guide.

Deployment: Linux / systemd

$ dotnet publish -c Release -o /opt/inkwell
$ sudo nano /etc/systemd/system/inkwell.service

[Unit]
Description=Inkwell Blog

[Service]
WorkingDirectory=/opt/inkwell
ExecStart=/opt/inkwell/Inkwell
Restart=always
RestartSec=10
User=www-data
Environment=ASPNETCORE_ENVIRONMENT=Production

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

$ sudo systemctl enable --now inkwell

Deployment: Docker

A Dockerfile is included in the repository root. Build and run:

$ docker build -t inkwell .
$ docker run -d -p 8080:8080 \
    -e Inkwell__Database__ConnectionString="..." \
    --name inkwell inkwell

A docker-compose.yml bundling SQL Server (mcr.microsoft.com/mssql/server:2022-latest) and Caddy (for automatic TLS) is available in /deploy/compose/.

Deployment: IIS

1. Install the .NET 10 Hosting Bundle on the server.
2. Publish: dotnet publish -c Release -o C:\inetpub\inkwell
3. Create a new IIS site pointing to C:\inetpub\inkwell.
4. Set the application pool to No Managed Code.
5. Ensure the app pool identity has read/write access to the publish directory.

Reverse proxy (nginx)

server {
    listen 443 ssl;
    server_name essays.example.com;

    location / {
        proxy_pass         http://localhost:5000;
        proxy_http_version 1.1;
        proxy_set_header   Upgrade $http_upgrade;
        proxy_set_header   Connection keep-alive;
        proxy_set_header   Host $host;
        proxy_set_header   X-Forwarded-For $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for;
        proxy_set_header   X-Forwarded-Proto $scheme;
        proxy_cache_bypass $http_upgrade;
    }
}