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Server Liquid Rendering

New hosted storefront themes are rendered by Shoppex, not by a browser SPA. The same core is used for:
  • live storefront cache misses
  • Builder preview
  • shoppex theme dev
  • theme validation and preview

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Render Path

request
  -> Shoppex storefront edge
  -> cache lookup
  -> Shoppex Liquid renderer
  -> Liquid HTML response
The edge layer handles domains, cache, and assets. Liquid HTML is rendered by Shoppex.

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Render Context

Templates receive a typed StorefrontRenderContext. The context is producer-built. It can include:
  • shop
  • settings
  • pageId
  • homeListing
  • catalogListing
  • product
  • relatedProducts
  • reviews
  • storeStats
  • services
  • platform HTML such as navigationHtml, footerHtml, and storefrontCommerceScriptHtml
Liquid reads this data. It does not compute missing stock, pricing, sorting, or checkout rules.

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Bootstrap v2

Liquid pages render real HTML and a small browser boot surface. Use the platform-provided raw HTML only where expected: 
{{ themeHeadHtml | raw }}
{{ bootstrapScript | raw }}
{{ storefrontCommerceScriptHtml | raw }}
Do not introduce a full browser-side store blob for Liquid themes. Liquid pages render from the server-built context.

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Layout Example

<!doctype html>
<html lang="en">
  <head>
    <title>{{ shop.name }}</title>
    {{ themeHeadHtml | raw }}
    {{ bootstrapScript | raw }}
    <link rel="stylesheet" href="{{ 'assets/built.css' | assetUrl: ctx }}">
  </head>
  <body>
    {{ navigationHtml | raw }}
    <main data-shoppex-render="server-liquid" data-page-id="{{ pageId }}">
      {{ blocksHtml | raw }}
    </main>
    {{ footerHtml | raw }}
    {{ storefrontCommerceScriptHtml | raw }}
  </body>
</html>

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Preview

Builder preview and CLI preview can include draft settings and preview metadata. Shoppex still builds required live slices such as catalog data, product data, reviews, and store stats.

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Why This Is The Hosted Theme Model

Liquid is the hosted storefront rendering model:
  • no per-theme app bundle is required for rendering HTML
  • no custom SSR script is required
  • no hydration contract is needed for the page shell
Platform commerce JavaScript still runs in the browser for cart and checkout behavior.

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Next Steps

Core Contract

Template vs producer responsibilities.

Build & Publish

Source validation, artifact creation, and publish.