EmailDSL

A framework-agnostic TypeScript DSL for building email-safe HTML.

Features

• Email-safe: Framework generates tables and inline styles automatically.
• Themable: Global theme support with component overrides.
• Responsive: Fluid layouts that work on mobile (with stacking support).
• TypeScript: Full type safety for all primitives.
• Zero dependencies: Lightweight and fast.

Installation

From NPM

pnpm add emaildsl
# or
npm install emaildsl

Local Development

For local development or to contribute, clone the repository:

git clone https://github.com/veri5ied/emaildsl.git
cd emaildsl
pnpm install
pnpm build

Usage

HTML (Framework Agnostic)

import { email, section, text, button } from "emaildsl";

const myEmail = email({
  title: "Hello",
  body: [
    section([
      text("Hello World"),
      button("Click Me", { href: "https://example.com" }),
    ]),
  ],
});

const html = myEmail.render();

React (Live Preview)

import { EmailPreview } from "emaildsl/react";
import { email, section, text } from "emaildsl";

const myEmail = email({
  body: [section([text("Hello")])],
});

function App() {
  return <EmailPreview config={myEmail.config} />;
}

Vue (Live Preview)

<script setup>
import { EmailPreview } from "emaildsl/vue";
import { email, section, text } from "emaildsl";

const myEmail = email({
  body: [section([text("Hello")])],
});
</script>

<template>
  <EmailPreview :config="myEmail.config" />
</template>

Primitives

Layout Primitives

• section(children, options) - Creates a layout section (renders as table row)
• column(children, options) - Creates a column within a section (renders as table cell)

Content Primitives

• text(content, options) - Creates a text element with optional styling
• button(label, options) - Creates a clickable button with href
• image(src, options) - Creates an image element with alt text and dimensions
• divider(options) - Creates a horizontal divider line
• spacer(height) - Creates vertical spacing (accepts px or em)

API Reference

Email Configuration

email({
  title: string;              // Email title (appears in <title> tag)
  body: Primitive[];          // Array of primitives
  theme?: Theme;              // Optional global theme
  lang?: string;              // Language code (default: 'en')
});

Theme Options

theme: {
  colors?: {
    primary?: string;
    secondary?: string;
    text?: string;
    background?: string;
  };
  fonts?: {
    family?: string;
    size?: string;
  };
  spacing?: {
    section?: string;
    element?: string;
  };
  button?: {
    borderRadius?: string;
    padding?: string;
  };
}

Styling System

Every primitive accepts a style option for inline CSS overrides:

text("Hello", {
  style: {
    fontSize: "24px",
    fontWeight: "bold",
    color: "#333333",
  },
});

Style priority (highest to lowest):

1. Element-level style option
2. Global theme configuration
3. Built-in defaults

Examples

Welcome Email

import { email, section, text, button, divider } from "emaildsl";

const welcomeEmail = email({
  title: "Welcome to Our Platform",
  theme: {
    colors: {
      primary: "#4CAF50",
      text: "#333333",
    },
  },
  body: [
    section([
      text("Welcome!", { style: { fontSize: "24px", fontWeight: "bold" } }),
      text("We're excited to have you on board."),
      button("Get Started", {
        href: "https://example.com/onboarding",
        style: { backgroundColor: "#4CAF50" },
      }),
      divider(),
      text("Questions? Reply to this email.", {
        style: { fontSize: "12px", color: "#666666" },
      }),
    ]),
  ],
});

const html = welcomeEmail.render();

Receipt Email

import { email, section, text, divider } from "emaildsl";

const receipt = email({
  title: "Order Receipt",
  body: [
    section([
      text("Order Confirmation", { style: { fontSize: "24px" } }),
      text("Order #12345"),
      divider(),
      text("Product Name"),
      text("$99.00", { style: { fontWeight: "bold" } }),
      text("Shipping: $5.00"),
      divider(),
      text("Total: $104.00", {
        style: { fontSize: "18px", fontWeight: "bold" },
      }),
    ]),
  ],
});

Multi-column Layout

import { email, section, column, text } from "emaildsl";

const newsletter = email({
  body: [
    section([
      column(
        [
          text("Column 1 Header", { style: { fontWeight: "bold" } }),
          text("Left side content goes here."),
        ],
        { width: "50%" },
      ),
      column(
        [
          text("Column 2 Header", { style: { fontWeight: "bold" } }),
          text("Right side content goes here."),
        ],
        { width: "50%" },
      ),
    ]),
  ],
});

Advanced Theming

import { email, section, text, button } from "emaildsl";

const themedEmail = email({
  theme: {
    colors: {
      primary: "#2196F3",
      secondary: "#FFC107",
      text: "#212121",
      background: "#FAFAFA",
    },
    fonts: {
      family: "Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif",
      size: "16px",
    },
    spacing: {
      section: "32px",
      element: "16px",
    },
    button: {
      borderRadius: "8px",
      padding: "14px 28px",
    },
  },
  body: [
    section([
      text("Themed Email"),
      button("Action Button", { href: "https://example.com" }),
    ]),
  ],
});

Email Client Support

EmailDSL generates HTML that works across all major email clients:

• Gmail (web, iOS, Android)
• Outlook 2016/2019/365 (Windows)
• Outlook.com
• Apple Mail (macOS, iOS)
• Yahoo Mail
• AOL Mail
• Thunderbird
• And more

Why EmailDSL?

The Problem

Writing HTML emails is notoriously difficult:

• Email clients use outdated rendering engines
• Modern CSS (Flexbox, Grid) doesn't work
• Styles must be inline
• Tables are required for layout
• Each client has unique quirks

The Solution

EmailDSL abstracts away the complexity:

// Instead of this:
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0" width="100%">
  <tr>
    <td style="padding: 20px; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; color: #333333;">
      Hello World
    </td>
  </tr>
</table>;

// Write this:
section([text("Hello World")]);

Development

Prerequisites

• Node.js 18+
• pnpm

Setup

git clone https://github.com/veri5ied/emaildsl.git
cd emaildsl
pnpm install

Commands

pnpm dev      # Watch mode with auto-rebuild
pnpm build    # Build for production
pnpm test     # Run tests
pnpm test:ui  # Run tests with UI
pnpm lint     # Lint code

Project Structure

emaildsl/
├── src/
│   ├── primitives/     # DSL primitive implementations
│   ├── renderer/       # HTML rendering logic
│   ├── types/          # TypeScript definitions
│   └── index.ts        # Main export
├── examples/           # Example email templates
├── tests/              # Unit + integration tests
└── package.json

TypeScript Support

EmailDSL is written in TypeScript and provides full type safety:

import { email, section, text } from "emaildsl";

// TypeScript will catch errors:
email({
  title: 123, // ❌ Error: Type 'number' is not assignable to type 'string'
  body: [
    section([
      text("Hello", {
        style: {
          color: "red",
          fontWeight: "bold",
          invalidProp: true, // ❌ Error: Object literal may only specify known properties
        },
      }),
    ]),
  ],
});

Roadmap

• Core TypeScript DSL
• HTML renderer with table-based layouts
• Inline style generation
• Global theme system
• Component-level style overrides
• Publish to npm
• React renderer (optional, for live previews)
• Vue renderer (optional)
• Svelte renderer (optional)
• Framework-agnostic usage in all JS environments
• Pre-built email template library
• Visual email builder
• Email testing utilities
• Integration with email sending services

Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please follow these steps:

1. Fork the repository
2. Create a feature branch (git checkout -b feature/amazing-feature)
3. Commit your changes (git commit -m 'Add amazing feature')
4. Push to the branch (git push origin feature/amazing-feature)
5. Open a Pull Request

Please ensure:

• All tests pass (pnpm test)
• Code is linted (pnpm lint)
• TypeScript types are correct
• You've added tests for new features

License

MIT License - see LICENSE file for details.

Support

• Issues: GitHub Issues
• Discussions: Coming soon
• Documentation: Coming soon

Acknowledgments

EmailDSL was created to solve the universal pain of writing cross-client compatible email HTML. It draws inspiration from React Email and MJML while maintaining complete framework independence.

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Built with TypeScript. Tested across major email clients.