Slidev

Slidev renders a markdown file as a presentation, with slides separated by ---. Mark a document, click the toolbar action, and the deck opens in its own OpenKnowledge window.

OpenKnowledge does not bundle or download Slidev. You install it yourself.

Install Slidev

Install the CLI and a theme. Themes ship as separate packages and a deck cannot open without the one it declares; @slidev/theme-default covers decks that declare none.

npm install -g @slidev/cli @slidev/theme-default

Or add both packages to the project. A project-local install takes precedence over a global one, which is how you pin a deck to a Slidev version.

Other install routes are in Slidev's install guide.

Turn on the plugin

Open Settings → User ▸ Plugins and switch on Slidev. It's a user plugin, so the choice stays on your device and is never committed.

The Slidev page in the sidebar reports whether OpenKnowledge found Slidev. If it didn't, the page offers the install command to copy and a Run in terminal button. Install, click back into OpenKnowledge, and the status updates without a restart.

Mark a document as a deck

Add slides: true to the document's frontmatter:

---
title: Product launch
slides: true
---

# Product launch

---

## Where we are

- Beta since March
- 40 teams onboarded

An Open in Slidev action appears in the editor toolbar. Activating it starts a Slidev server for that document and opens the deck in its own window.

The action appears only when Slidev resolves. If you expect it and don't see it, check the plugin page.

Editing while presenting

Edit the document and the open deck updates — Slidev watches the same file OpenKnowledge saves to. Your position in the deck is preserved. Expect a beat between typing and the refresh; OpenKnowledge debounces its writes to disk.

Closing a deck window stops that deck's Slidev process. Quitting OpenKnowledge stops all of them.

Writing decks

Past the frontmatter flag it's ordinary Slidev:

• Syntax guide — separators, per-slide frontmatter, layouts, speaker notes, click animations, code blocks.
• Themes gallery — install a theme's package before a deck declares it.
• Built-in components — the Vue components available inside slides.

Two notes for longer decks:

• Multi-file decks work. Slidev's src: include pulls a slide's content from another file, so a deck can be one entry file plus a folder of slides.
• Keep the deck inside the project. OpenKnowledge only opens documents that resolve inside the open project, including through symlinks.