Cow

Cow is a classic take on a web runtime for JavaScript and TypeScript. Cow allows you to write server-side JavaScript or TypeScript with HTML, with batteries included. If you like PHP, you'll love Cow.

Learn more about Cow in the documentation.

Installation

Cow supports multiple runtimes. For a quick install, use Node.js 22.16 or later.

Run without installing:

npx @cowlang/cow my-site

Install cow globally:

npm install --global @cowlang/cow

Or to add it to your project:

npm install --save-exact @cowlang/cow

Your first page

Create a folder called my-site, and save this as my-site/index.cow:

<?js const name = req.get('name') || 'world' ?>
<h1>Hello, <?= h(name) ?>!</h1>

Start Cow:

npx @cowlang/cow my-site

Open http://127.0.0.1:8000/?name=Clover to see "Hello, Clover!" Edit the file and refresh to see your changes.

Learn more about writing pages in the docs.

Additional resources

• Getting started: installation, routing, deployment, and syntax checking.
• Request and response API: query strings, forms, uploads, redirects, and JSON.
• SQLite and sessions: queries, transactions, cookies, and sign-in.
• JavaScript runtimes: running on Bun, Deno, or Nub.
• Examples: a news site, a forum, file uploads, and a diagnostics page.

Cow hasn't reached 1.0 yet, so expect its APIs to change.

Contributing

To contribute, read the contributing instructions.

License

MIT