Getting Started

CanvasMesh turns any file into a shareable, renderable URL. This guide walks through creating your first canvas from three angles: dashboard, CLI, and SDK.

Prerequisites

• A CanvasMesh account. Sign up at canvasmesh.app with Google.
• An API key (see Authentication) if you plan to use the CLI or SDK.

Option 1 — Dashboard

1. Open canvasmesh.app and click New Canvas.
2. Drag and drop any file — images, PDFs, 3D models, video, audio, Markdown, Jupyter notebooks.
3. CanvasMesh picks the best built-in renderer by file extension. See Renderer types for the full mapping.
4. Click Share to get a public link.

Option 2 — CLI

npm install -g @canvasmesh/cli
canvasmesh login --token <your-api-key>
canvasmesh push ./report.md --title "Q2 Report"

The push command creates a new canvas and prints the view URL. See the CLI reference.

Option 3 — SDK

import { CanvasClient } from '@canvasmesh/sdk-js';

const client = new CanvasClient({ apiKey: process.env.CANVASMESH_API_KEY! });

const canvas = await client.create({
  title: 'Q2 Report',
  ext: 'md',
  content: '# Quarterly Report\n\nRevenue up 30%.',
});

console.log(canvas.view_url);

See the SDK reference for the full API.

Next steps

Installation Install the canvasmesh CLI globally and the JavaScript SDK in your project.

Authentication Generate and use API keys with the CLI, SDK, or raw REST API.

Create canvases Upload files, refresh content, and switch renderers across CLI, SDK, and REST.

Share with expiration Public share links with optional expiration and revocation.