Frontmatter cheatsheet

The full frontmatter schema is defined in src/content.config.ts. Every custom field is .optional() — the only required key is title:.

Complete field reference

---
# ── Required ─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
title: Post title                       # required by Starlight

# ── SEO / preview ────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
description: One sentence (≤160 chars)  # meta description, social preview

# ── Post metadata (all optional) ─────────────────────────────────────────
date: 2026-07-30                        # ISO 8601 date
pubDate: 2026-07-30                     # alias for date (either works)
showDate: true                          # opt in to display the date
tags: [kubernetes, security, rbac]      # lowercase, kebab-case
draft: true                             # hide from Recent posts + noindex

# ── Sidebar controls ─────────────────────────────────────────────────────
sidebar:
  hidden: true                          # hide from sidebar entirely
  label: Custom label                   # override sidebar text
  order: 1                              # lower first (default: alphabetical)
  badge:
    text: Lab                           # small tag next to sidebar item
    variant: tip                        # note | tip | success | danger | caution

# ── Hero image (Starlight built-in) ──────────────────────────────────────
hero:
  tagline: Optional subtitle
  image:
    file: ../../assets/hero.webp        # relative from the page
  actions:
    - text: Read more
      link: /kubernetes/
      icon: right-arrow

# ── Page template ────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
template: splash                        # or "doc" (default)
---

Minimum viable frontmatter

For an Obsidian-friendly .md post with no bells and whistles:

---
title: My new note
---

That’s it. Everything else is optional.

Common patterns

---
title: Lab · Break-glass RBAC recovery
description: Recovering cluster access when your admin role is misbound.
date: 2026-07-30
tags: [kubernetes, rbac, incident]
showDate: true
sidebar:
  badge:
    text: Lab
    variant: tip
---

---
title: SAA-C03 · VPC and Networking
description: VPC subnets, route tables, NAT, endpoints, Transit Gateway.
date: 2026-07-15
tags: [aws, saa-c03, network]
sidebar:
  order: 1
  # add a badge only if you want visual grouping BEYOND the folder name:
  # badge:
  #   text: SAA-C03
  #   variant: success
---

---
title: Notes on ArgoCD sync waves
description: Ordering resource application in a GitOps rollout.
draft: true
---

draft: true hides the page from Recent posts and adds noindex. Remove the flag when publishing.

---
title: Kubernetes
description: Notes on running production-grade Kubernetes.
sidebar:
  hidden: true
---

Use for every index.mdx in a section — reachable via LinkCards from home or from the section’s parent card grid.

The `showDate` opt-in

Dates are off by default. To reveal the date:

date: 2026-07-30
showDate: true

That single flag controls both places:

Recent posts on the homepage — date column appears.
Post page — a small monospace date renders under the <h1>.

Leave showDate off for evergreen reference material.