create-stackforge-app

A production-ready CLI scaffolding tool that generates a full-stack application with Next.js (App Router), NestJS, Prisma, PostgreSQL/SQLite, Tailwind CSS, shadcn/ui, JWT authentication, shared API contracts (Zod), Axios, Docker, and pnpm workspaces.

Releases: GitHub Releases

Features

• ⚡ Next.js 14 with App Router and TypeScript
• 🛡️ NestJS backend with JWT authentication
• 📜 Shared contracts — Zod schemas and types in packages/contracts (API + web)
• 🗄️ Prisma ORM with PostgreSQL or SQLite
• 🎨 Tailwind CSS + shadcn/ui components
• 🐳 Docker and docker-compose support
• 🔍 Prisma Studio in Docker (PostgreSQL stacks; bound to localhost)
• 📦 pnpm workspaces (apps/*, packages/*)
• 🎛️ Presets — dashboard, minimal, or api-only
• 🔧 stackforge doctor / stackforge info in generated projects
• 🔐 Auth flow: register, login, protected users API
• 🚀 Run with docker compose up -d or pnpm dev from the project root

Node.js: 18+ supported; Node 22 is used in StackForge CI.

Usage

npx create-stackforge-app@latest

Requirements for generated projects

The generated projects use pnpm workspaces. Node.js includes corepack, which installs pnpm automatically. If you see a "pnpm: command not found" error, run:

corepack enable
corepack prepare pnpm@9 --activate

Then pnpm install, pnpm dev, etc. will work.

You will be prompted for:

• Project name
• Project description
• Database (PostgreSQL or SQLite)
• Docker support
• Automatic dependency installation

Presets

Non-interactive mode

Skip prompts entirely with -y/--yes, or pass individual flags to skip only those prompts:

# Defaults: PostgreSQL + Docker + auto-install
npx create-stackforge-app@latest my-app -y

# Custom, no prompts
npx create-stackforge-app@latest my-app -y --database sqlite --no-docker --no-install

npx create-stackforge-app@latest my-api -y --preset api
npx create-stackforge-app@latest my-app -y --preset minimal

Inside a generated project:

pnpm run db:setup
pnpm dev
pnpm run doctor
pnpm run info

For PostgreSQL with generated Docker support, run docker compose up -d postgres before pnpm run db:setup. A full Docker stack uses docker compose up --build -d and applies existing migrations automatically.

Run pnpm dev from the project root so packages/contracts is built and watched (do not start only a single app filter unless you have already built contracts).

Generated Project Structure

my-app/
├── apps/
│   ├── api/          # NestJS application
│   └── web/          # Next.js application (not included for `--preset api`)
├── packages/
│   ├── contracts/    # Zod schemas + shared API types
│   ├── eslint-config/
│   ├── typescript-config/
│   └── ui/           # shared UI stub
├── stackforge.json   # StackForge project manifest (schema v2)
├── AGENTS.md         # Architecture notes for humans and AI tools
├── .stackforge/      # Reserved for StackForge tooling metadata
├── docker-compose.yml
├── README.md
└── .env.example

Projects created with 1.2.x used frontend/ + backend/ (manifest v1). See docs/MIGRATION-monorepo.md.

PostgreSQL + Docker: Prisma Studio is exposed at http://127.0.0.1:5555 (localhost only).

Development

Install dependencies

Make sure pnpm is available (see corepack):

pnpm install

Build

pnpm run build

Run locally

node ./bin/create-stackforge-app.js

Smoke-test generated apps (maintainers)

After changing templates or the CLI:

pnpm run smoke              # SQLite + PostgreSQL generate smoke
pnpm run smoke:sqlite       # SQLite (dashboard preset)
pnpm run smoke:postgresql   # PostgreSQL (dashboard preset)
pnpm run smoke:presets      # SQLite: dashboard, minimal, api
pnpm run smoke:docker       # Docker build + API health + Prisma Studio query

See Phases-stack-forge.md, docs/file-ownership.md, and docs/tested-stack.md.

License

MIT