Getting started

Install

go install github.com/frankbardon/prism/cmd/prism@latest
prism version    # prism v0.2.0

Bootstrap a project

mkdir my-project && cd my-project
prism init

This writes:

.prism/
├── schemas/         # JSON Schema files (offline validation + autocomplete)
├── examples/        # 8 curated starter specs
├── editor/          # VSCode / JetBrains / Neovim / Vim config templates
└── README.md

First chart

cp .prism/examples/bar_basic.json my-chart.prism.json
prism plot my-chart.prism.json > chart.svg
open chart.svg

Editor setup

Each entry in .prism/editor/ has a header comment with install instructions. The fastest path:

• VSCode — copy .prism/editor/vscode-settings.json into .vscode/settings.json. *.prism.json files get autocomplete + inline validation from the embedded schema.
• JetBrains — copy .prism/editor/jetbrains.xml to .idea/jsonSchemas.xml.
• Neovim — paste the .prism/editor/neovim.lua snippet into your init.lua (requires nvim-lspconfig).
• Vim — paste the .prism/editor/vim.alelint block into your .vimrc (requires dense-analysis/ale and prism in PATH).

Validating a spec

prism validate my-chart.prism.json

Returns valid on stdout (exit 0) or one or more PRISM_* errors with fixup suggestions. Add --json for machine-readable envelopes.

Rendering formats

prism plot my-chart.prism.json --format svg > chart.svg
prism plot my-chart.prism.json --format pdf > chart.pdf
prism plot dashboard.json --format pdf --paginate > dashboard.pdf

Themes

prism plot bar.json --theme=dark > bar-dark.svg
prism plot bar.json --theme=print > bar-print.svg

Bundled themes: light (default), dark, print. Custom themes via theme.json — see Themes concepts.

Embed in a static page (no server)

Prism ships as a WebAssembly module that renders client-side. Build the bundle, copy it into your site:

make build-wasm
./bin/prism static-bundle --wasm ./public/prism

Then drop a <prism-chart> element into any HTML page:

<script src="/prism/wasm_exec.js"></script>
<script type="module" src="/prism/prism-element.mjs"></script>
<prism-chart spec="/specs/my-chart.prism.json"></prism-chart>

See Browser / WASM concepts and the static-site cookbook for mdBook / Astro / Hugo integration recipes.

What’s next

• Browse the gallery for spec patterns.
• Read Spec concepts to learn the data → transform → mark → encoding pipeline.
• See Multi-source to join multiple .pulse files in one chart.
• See Browser / WASM for the standalone client-side rendering path.
• Read Migration from Vega-Lite if you already know Vega-Lite.