It is not difficult to get away from that ecosystem, they simply need to not be included. It is in fact more work to include them and introduced unnecessary complexity.

Several markdown to html generators exist that are well established which simply use the base languages: node, python, go, etc. Instead of using a framework that isn't suited to the task, they focus on structure and features and work on that. By working on the features, structure, and grammar, the tooling will emerge.

> I agree, but it's just too difficult to get away from the React ecosystem...

Why? What specifically are you using for "website with markdown" that needs React?

> Do you have suggestions on a better alternative?

Yes.

1. For turning markdown into html on the server (i.e. render the HTML on the server and then deliver it) use pandoc. I use it like this for my blog: https://gist.github.com/lelanthran/2634fc2508c93a437ba5ca511...

2. For turning markdown into html on the client, write a custom component that parses the markdown into DOM nodes allowing the page author to simply do `<dynamic-markdown remote-src=some/path/to/page.md>`. You can even use one of the many existing Vanilla JS libraries to do this within the custom component.

In either of those two options above, what value does React add?

Why not using marked.js or equivalent, plugging it with a Fetch API instead?

example:

  <html>
  <head><title>hello</title></head>
  <body>
  <main id=root ></main>
  <script src=./marked.min.js async defer ></script>
  <script>
  async function load() {
    let element = document.querySelector("main#root");
    await fetch("./index.md") 
      .then(resp => resp.text())
      .then(text => marked(text, { ... }))
      .then(html => {
        element.innerHTML = html;
      });
  }
  window.onload = load;
  </script>
  </body>
  </html>

since it directly injects the resulting html, you may set "unsafe HTML" option in marked (or markdown.js) and include <title> tags within your markdown document. this will _also_ rewrite the browser title(s)

> edit: formatting

https://htmx.org/. - for smaller sites. Likely the type of site you'd make content in markdown and have it transformed?

Not op, but check out unsuck[0] for some inspiration.

[0]: https://unsuckjs.com/

You could make it simpler in Python, Go, PHP, Rust, Elixir, Haskell, Ruby, and even in JavaScript if you want to step outside the JS ecosystem.

Just try to make something without React and you light see the light. It's actually not difficult.

Not difficult at all