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MDI

HTML / TXT / EPUB / DOCX / PDF outputs

Prerequisites: Rendering model and the Chromium/PDF boundary.

Every output below is a transformation of the same MDI document IR (see Document IR) — none of them is a second syntax layer, and none of them re-decides what a piece of source text means. This page is the package-boundary view; Rendering model is the renderer-internals view of the same five outputs.

FormatPackageWhat it actually is
HTML@illusions-lab/mdi (renderHtml)A standalone HTML document plus the embedded .mdi-* stylesheet
TXT (5 flavors)@illusions-lab/mdi (renderTextFormat) / CLIPlain, ruby-preserving, or a specific Japanese publishing platform’s plain-text convention — see TXT export flavors
EPUB@illusions-lab/mdi (renderEpub)A real EPUB 3 archive: reflowable XHTML chapters + nav.xhtml + CSS + OPF package, zipped by Rust
DOCX@illusions-lab/mdi (renderDocx)A real OOXML (WordprocessingML) document, zipped by Rust
PDF@illusions-lab/mdi-to-pdfRust-rendered HTML/print CSS, laid out and rasterized by a locally installed Chromium-family browser

Four of these five are produced entirely inside Rust — the CLI and the JavaScript package call straight into mdi-core’s renderer functions with no intermediate JavaScript rendering step. PDF is the one exception, and only because generating a PDF requires launching an OS process (Chromium), which the Rust core itself does (via render_pdf/find_chromium) when called from a native host, and which the Node.js CLI reaches through @illusions-lab/mdi-to-pdf.

Legacy compatibility packages

Section titled “Legacy compatibility packages”

@illusions-lab/mdi-to-hast, @illusions-lab/mdi-to-html, @illusions-lab/mdi-to-epub, and @illusions-lab/mdi-to-docx still exist and are still published — they predate the current Rust-native renderers and operate on mdast/HAST trees instead of calling Rust’s render functions directly. They remain useful for unified-ecosystem consumers who already have an mdast tree (via the remark adapter) and want to render it without a second parse. The CLI itself no longer uses them for its own build command — see Bindings: CLI for exactly which Rust function backs each --to value today. One concrete, current difference worth knowing: @illusions-lab/mdi-to-hast’s stylesheet matches SYNTAX.md more closely than the CSS Rust’s own render_html embeds — see Migration and compatibility: stylesheet parity.

What’s still pending across every renderer

Section titled “What’s still pending across every renderer”

Cover images, configurable chapter-split level, and full page-geometry/font control for EPUB and DOCX are not yet wired to an export profile — both renderers currently only read metadata (title/author/lang/writing-mode) straight from front matter. This is tracked explicitly on Rust Core API status: not yet implemented, not silently absent.

Next steps

Section titled “Next steps”