Ghost

# MISSION: Scaffold "Ghost" Production Architecture
You are an expert Senior Staff Software Architect and Full-Stack Engineer. Your mission is to scaffold and implement a production-grade, highly reliable, and modular codebase following the proven architecture of **Ghost**.
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## 1. PROJECT SPECIFICATIONS & BENCHMARK
- **Reference Architecture**: Ghost
- **What It Does**: Ghost is an open-source, self-hostable Node.js publishing platform for blogs, newsletters and paid memberships, built as a pnpm/Nx monorepo containing a core server, a React admin app migrating off Ember, and a set of independently built embeddable widgets.
- **Domain & Category**: Content Platform
- **Production Scale**: 20+ people
- **Development Mode**: CLASSIC
- **Architectural Rationale**: Ghost runs its core server, a React admin app that is replacing a legacy Ember admin in place, and every public-facing widget as separately Vite-built packages inside one pnpm/Nx monorepo, so the publishing surface, the editor and each embeddable script can evolve and ship on their own schedule.
- **Live Website Reference**: https://ghost.org
- **Source Repository**: https://github.com/TryGhost/Ghost
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## 2. PRODUCTION TECH STACK
- **Full Stack Array**: TypeScript, JavaScript, Node.js, React, Ember, Handlebars, Vite, pnpm, Nx, SQLite, Tinybird, ClickHouse, Docker
- **Primary Language(s)**: TypeScript, JavaScript
- **License of the reference repo**: MIT
- **Frontend**: React — New admin dashboard (apps/admin) built with Vite, TanStack Query and Radix UI primitives, replacing the Ember admin in place.; Ember — Legacy ghost-admin client (apps/ember-admin) still ships from the monorepo alongside the newer React admin during the migration.; Vite — Bundler for the new admin app and every embeddable widget (portal, comments-ui, sodo-search, signup-form, announcement-bar, activitypub).; Preact — Powers admin-toolbar, the lightweight staff toolbar injected into published site pages.; Handlebars — Templating language for server-rendered themes; the default Casper theme ships under ghost/core content/themes/casper.
- **Backend & APIs**: Node.js — ghost/core is the Node.js application server; the dev Docker image pins Node 22.; Ghost API framework — Internal @tryghost/api-framework and @tryghost/admin-api-schema packages provide shared REST request handling and JSON-schema validation for ghost/core.
- **Data & persistence**: SQLite — Selectable local/dev persistence backend (better-sqlite3) via a dedicated dev:sqlite compose profile.; ClickHouse — Storage engine underneath the local Tinybird analytics stack used to develop and test analytics events.; Tinybird — Real-time analytics platform for site/traffic analytics; e2e tests sync fixture state against a local Tinybird instance.
- **Infrastructure & deploy**: Docker — Dev container (docker/ghost-dev), a fake-mailgun stub for local email testing, and the flattened Tinybird/ClickHouse local image.; pnpm — Monorepo package manager with a strict dependency catalog (catalogMode: strict) shared across every workspace.
- **Tooling, testing & ops**: Nx — Task orchestrator running cached build/lint/test targets across every ghost/*, apps/*, packages/* and koenig/* workspace.; Vitest — Primary test runner for ghost/core and most apps/packages (test:watch, test:unit scripts).
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## 3. KEY ARCHITECTURAL DECISIONS (audited from https://github.com/TryGhost/Ghost @ 6f86cb6)
1. **React admin is replacing Ember admin in place, not on a separate branch**: apps/admin (name @tryghost/admin, Vite + React + TanStack Query + Radix UI) and apps/ember-admin (name ghost-admin, Ember.js, version 6.64.1-rc.0) both live in the same monorepo and ship together, so the admin UI migrates screen by screen instead of as a big-bang rewrite.
2. **Every embeddable public widget is its own Vite-built UMD package**: portal, comments-ui, sodo-search, signup-form, announcement-bar, admin-toolbar and activitypub each declare a umd/ output and a shared build config from configs/vite-public-app/package.json, so a published Ghost site loads only the small standalone scripts it actually uses instead of one monolithic admin bundle.
3. **Site analytics run on Tinybird/ClickHouse, not an in-house pipeline**: docker/tinybird-local-slim/Dockerfile flattens a real Tinybird-local image (CLICKHOUSE_VERSION env var, MinIO-backed storage) for local and CI use, docker/tb-cli/Dockerfile installs the Tinybird CLI itself, and e2e/package.json exposes a tinybird:sync script to keep local Tinybird state aligned with test fixtures.
4. **pnpm plus Nx with a locked dependency catalog governs the whole monorepo**: pnpm-workspace.yaml sets catalogMode: strict, blockExoticSubdeps: true and a minimumReleaseAge of 3 days for new dependency versions, while nx.json defines cached build/lint/test targets that run across every workspace listed in pnpm-workspace.yaml (ghost/*, apps/*, packages/**, koenig/*, configs/*).
5. **ActivityPub support ships as its own app, not bolted onto ghost/core**: apps/activitypub is a separate @tryghost/activitypub package with its own Vite build and an ./api export consumed by apps/admin, keeping Fediverse protocol code out of the main ghost/core server package.
6. **The editor is a Lexical-based rewrite, kept compatible with the older Mobiledoc format**: apps/admin depends on @tryghost/koenig-lexical for its rich-text editor, while koenig/kg-default-cards still ships "Mobiledoc card definitions for Ghost's editor" (version 10.3.6) so posts authored under the previous Mobiledoc-based editor keep rendering.
7. **Local dev containerizes optional external dependencies, including email**: docker/fake-mailgun/Dockerfile provides a stand-in for Mailgun so pnpm dev:fake-mailgun works without real credentials, and root package.json defines separate compose-profile scripts (dev:sqlite, dev:mailgun, dev:analytics, dev:storage, dev:stripe) that opt individual optional services in or out of the dev stack.
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## 4. NON-NEGOTIABLE ARCHITECTURAL GUARDRAILS
1. **Monorepo & Modular Separation**:
   - Structure as a Turborepo monorepo with strict package boundaries:
     - `apps/web`: Application UI, routing, layouts, and server endpoints.
     - `packages/ui`: Shared design tokens, CSS variables, and Radix UI primitive components.
     - `packages/db`: Database schemas, client singleton, declarative migrations, and seed scripts.
     - `packages/config`: Shared TypeScript, ESLint, and build configurations.
2. **Strict Type Safety & Zero `any` Policy**:
   - Enable `strict: true`, `noImplicitAny: true`, and `strictNullChecks: true`.
   - Validate ALL external inputs, API request bodies, and query parameters with **Zod** schemas before execution.
3. **Frontend & Rendering Guidelines**:
   - Utilize Vite 6 with TanStack Router for fully type-safe routing. Manage server state and caching via TanStack Query v5 with optimistic UI updates.
4. **Design System & Aesthetics**:
   - Keep every color, radius, shadow and font in a single token file (CSS variables) and consume tokens everywhere; never hardcode hex values in components.
   - Prefer crisp 1px borders and one subtle shadow scale over blurry default shadows. Pair one sans-serif for body/headings with one monospace for tags, badges, metrics, and code.
5. **Data Layer & Reliability**:
   - Write declarative schema definitions with foreign keys, composite indexes on queried filters, and automated timestamp triggers.
   - Use connection pooling and prepared statements for serverless database execution.
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## 5. STEP-BY-STEP SCAFFOLDING ROADMAP
- **Phase 1: Workspace & Root Config**: Initialize package manager, monorepo configuration (`turbo.json`, `tsconfig.base.json`, `package.json`).
- **Phase 2: Database Schema & Client**: Set up the data layer (SQLite, ClickHouse, Tinybird): client, connection pool, models, and migration scripts.
- **Phase 3: Design Tokens & UI Primitives**: Build accessible `Button`, `Input`, `Card`, `Badge`, and layout wrappers inside `packages/ui`.
- **Phase 4: Core Application Routes & Handlers**: Implement primary authentication, user session handling, and application routes.
- **Phase 5: Quality Assurance & Build Verification**: Run `tsc --noEmit`, ESLint, Prettier, and smoke test suites to ensure zero compilation or runtime errors.
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## 6. EXECUTION INSTRUCTIONS
1. Review all specifications, architectural guardrails, and stack choices above.
2. Present the full monorepo directory tree structure.
3. Systematically generate the complete, production-ready codebase according to the 5-phase roadmap above — starting with the root workspace setup, followed by the database schema, UI design system package, and full-stack application routes until the repository is fully scaffolded and ready to run.