Quick start

This guide will show you how to initialize the CKEditor 5 rich-text editor from source.

# How to install the framework?

npx ckeditor5-package-generator 

The CKEditor 5 Framework consists of several npm packages. To install it you need:

• Node.js 18.0.0+
• npm 5.7.1+ (note: some npm 5+ versions were known to cause problems, especially with deduplicating packages; upgrade npm when in doubt)

Besides Node.js and npm you also need webpack@5 with a few additional packages to use the framework. They are needed to bundle the source code. Read more about building CKEditor 5 in the Integrating from source guide.

# Let’s start!

This guide assumes that you are familiar with npm and that your project uses npm already. If not, see the npm documentation or call npm init in an empty directory and keep your fingers crossed.

First, install the packages needed to build CKEditor 5:

npm install --save \
    css-loader@5 \
    postcss-loader@4 \
    raw-loader@4 \
    style-loader@2 \
    webpack@5 \
    webpack-cli@4

The minimal webpack configuration needed to enable building CKEditor 5 is:

// webpack.config.js

'use strict';

const path = require( 'path' );
const { styles } = require( '@ckeditor/ckeditor5-dev-utils' );

module.exports = {
    // https://webpack.js.org/configuration/entry-context/
    entry: './app.js',

    // https://webpack.js.org/configuration/output/
    output: {
        path: path.resolve( __dirname, 'dist' ),
        filename: 'bundle.js'
    },

    module: {
        rules: [
            {
                test: /ckeditor5-[^/\\]+[/\\]theme[/\\]icons[/\\][^/\\]+\.svg$/,

                use: [ 'raw-loader' ]
            },
            {
                test: /ckeditor5-[^/\\]+[/\\]theme[/\\].+\.css$/,

                use: [
                    {
                        loader: 'style-loader',
                        options: {
                            injectType: 'singletonStyleTag',
                            attributes: {
                                'data-cke': true
                            }
                        }
                    },
                    'css-loader',
                    {
                        loader: 'postcss-loader',
                        options: {
                            postcssOptions: styles.getPostCssConfig( {
                                themeImporter: {
                                    themePath: require.resolve( '@ckeditor/ckeditor5-theme-lark' )
                                },
                                minify: true
                            } )
                        }
                    }
                ]
            }
        ]
    },

    // Useful for debugging.
    devtool: 'source-map',

    // By default webpack logs warnings if the bundle is bigger than 200kb.
    performance: { hints: false }
};

# Creating an editor

You can now install some of the CKEditor 5 Framework packages which will allow you to initialize a simple rich-text editor. Keep in mind, however, that all packages (excluding @ckeditor/ckeditor5-dev-*) must have the same version as the base editor package.
You can start with the classic editor with a small set of features.

npm install --save \
    @ckeditor/ckeditor5-dev-utils \
    @ckeditor/ckeditor5-editor-classic \
    @ckeditor/ckeditor5-essentials \
    @ckeditor/ckeditor5-paragraph \
    @ckeditor/ckeditor5-basic-styles \
    @ckeditor/ckeditor5-theme-lark

Based on these packages you can create a simple application.

// app.js

import { ClassicEditor } from '@ckeditor/ckeditor5-editor-classic';
import { Bold, Italic } from '@ckeditor/ckeditor5-basic-styles';
import { Essentials } from '@ckeditor/ckeditor5-essentials';
import { Paragraph } from '@ckeditor/ckeditor5-paragraph';

ClassicEditor
    .create( document.querySelector( '#editor' ), {
        plugins: [ Essentials, Paragraph, Bold, Italic ],
        toolbar: [ 'bold', 'italic' ]
    } )
    .then( editor => {
        console.log( 'Editor was initialized', editor );
    } )
    .catch( error => {
        console.error( error.stack );
    } );

You can now run webpack to build the application. To do that, call the webpack executable:

./node_modules/.bin/webpack --mode development

You can also install webpack-cli globally (using npm install -g) and run it via a globally available webpack.

Alternatively, you can add it as an npm script:

"scripts": {
    "build": "webpack --mode development"
}

And use it with:

yarn run build

npm adds ./node_modules/.bin/ to the PATH automatically, so in this case you do not need to install webpack-cli globally.

If everything worked correctly, you should see:

p@m /workspace/quick-start> ./node_modules/.bin/webpack --mode development
Hash: c96beab038124d61568f
Version: webpack 4.15.1
Time: 3023ms
Built at: 2018-07-05 17:37:38
        Asset      Size  Chunks             Chunk Names
    bundle.js  2.45 MiB    main  [emitted]  main
bundle.js.map  2.39 MiB    main  [emitted]  main
[./app.js] 638 bytes {main} [built]
[./node_modules/webpack/buildin/global.js] (webpack)/buildin/global.js 489 bytes {main} [built]
[./node_modules/webpack/buildin/harmony-module.js] (webpack)/buildin/harmony-module.js 573 bytes {main} [built]
    + 491 hidden modules

# Running the editor

Finally, it is time to create an HTML page:

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en">
    <head>
        <meta charset="utf-8">
        <title>CKEditor 5 Framework – Quick start</title>
    </head>
    <body>
        <div id="editor">
            <p>Editor content goes here.</p>
        </div>

        <script src="dist/bundle.js"></script>
    </body>
</html>

Open this page in your browser and you should see the simple WYSIWYG editor up and running. Make sure to check the browser console in case anything seems wrong.

# What’s next

If you finished this guide, you should definitely check out the Creating a simple plugin guide that will teach you some basics of developing features in the CKEditor 5 ecosystem.

If you are more into reading about the CKEditor 5 architecture, check out the Introduction to CKEditor 5 architecture.