What is Alap?

Getting Started: Casual Mode · Installation · Quick Start · Configuration

What if a link could offer

A normal link goes to one place. Click it, you're there.

An Alap link opens a small menu of options — and the reader picks where to go.

<alap-link query=".coffee">coffee spots</alap-link>

Click that, and instead of going to one URL, you see a menu of every coffee shop in your library.

How it works

You build a library of links. Each link gets tags — simple labels that describe it:

{
  "bluebottle": {
    "label": "Blue Bottle Coffee",
    "url": "https://bluebottlecoffee.com",
    "tags": ["coffee", "sf"]
  },
  "devocion": {
    "label": "Devocion",
    "url": "https://devocion.com",
    "tags": ["coffee", "nyc"]
  },
  "stumptown": {
    "label": "Stumptown Coffee",
    "url": "https://stumptowncoffee.com",
    "tags": ["coffee", "nyc"]
  }
}

Then in your HTML, you write a query that picks which links to show:

<alap-link query=".coffee">coffee spots</alap-link>

The .coffee means "everything tagged coffee." Click it, get a menu with all three shops.

Tags are the key idea

If you've used CSS classes, you already get it. A CSS class groups elements so you can style them together. An Alap tag groups links so you can summon them together.

Try these — click each one:

· ·

One link can have many tags. Many links can share a tag.

You can combine tags

Three operators let you narrow, widen, or exclude:

Operator	Meaning	Try it
+	AND (both tags)
|	OR (either tag)	<alap-link query=".nyc
-	WITHOUT (exclude)

These read like sentences. .coffee + .nyc just means "things that are coffee and NYC."

A real example

Say you write a blog about cities. You have 50 links in your library — restaurants, parks, museums, bridges — each tagged by city and category.

On your NYC page, one line of HTML:

Check out some <alap-link query=".nyc + .food">great food</alap-link>
or walk across a <alap-link query=".nyc + .bridge">famous bridge</alap-link>.

Each link becomes a curated menu. The reader picks. You never have to choose one "best" URL — you give them options.

Here's what that looks like: Check out some or walk across a .

That's it

Tags in, menu out.

Everything else Alap can do — image galleries, detail panels, live feeds, search patterns — is there when you want it. None of it is required to get started.

When you're ready for more: Quick Start walks you through a working example in 2 minutes.