I built a resume compiler in Go — write YAML, get every format

I got tired of fighting Word docs and Canva templates every time I updated my resume.

Your resume is structured data. A name, jobs, dates, skills. Once I realized that, I stopped treating it like a document and started treating it like a data model with renderers. That's resumelang.

How it works

Write one resume.yml:

# yaml-language-server: $schema=https://resumelang.dev/schema/v1.json
resumelang: v1

meta:
  theme: sap          # 13 built-in themes
  language: en
  page_size: a4
  sections:
    - summary
    - experience
    - skills
    - education
    - projects

person:
  name:     Jane Doe
  title:    Senior Software Engineer
  email:    [e-mail]
  github:   janedoe
  linkedin: janedoe

summary: |
  Experienced engineer with 8 years building distributed systems.

experience:
  - company:  Acme Corp
    role:     Lead Engineer
    start:    "2021"
    end:      ""
    highlights:
      - Scaled API to 10M requests/day
      - Reduced CI deploy time by 60%
    tags: [Go, Kubernetes, Postgres]

skills:
  - category: Languages
    skills: [Go, TypeScript, Python, Rust]

Run one command:

resumelang build resume.yml

Get:

dist/
├── resume.html   # themed, print-ready
├── resume.json   # JSON Resume schema
├── resume.md     # GitHub-flavored markdown
└── resume.txt    # ATS-safe plain text

The theme system

13 built-in themes: SAP, Vercel, Linear, Aurora, Material, Brutalist, Terminal, Editorial, Dossier, Academic, Finance, Timeline, Minimal.

Switch with one line:

meta:
  theme: vercel

Your content doesn't move. Only the rendering changes.

Each theme is a folder with a validated theme.yml spec:

spec: v1
name: aurora
version: 1.0.0
author: ovsec

supports:
  layouts: [timeline, grid]
  blocks: [bullets, tags, text]

tokens:
  colors:
    accent: "#6366f1"
  spacing:
    section_gap: 24
  typography:
    heading_weight: 600
    body_size: 14

The compiler validates every theme at load time against the spec. Missing template → build error. Unknown component → warning. This means community themes that pass resumelang theme validate are guaranteed to render correctly.

Why Go

• Single binary, zero runtime dependencies
• Same binary serves the web editor, runs the CLI, and powers the GitHub Action
• Cross-compiles to Linux/macOS/Windows without Docker
• go install github.com/ovsec/resumelang@latest and you're done

The web editor

The editor is Go Fiber + HTMX + CodeMirror 5. No React, no build step.

• Edit YAML on the left, live preview on the right
• Theme gallery rendered server-side via HTMX lazy loading
• Share modal with gzip-encoded URLs and AES-GCM password encryption
• Decryption happens entirely in the browser — server never sees resume content
• Sign in with GitHub or LinkedIn to save resumes to a dashboard

GitHub Actions path

Drop this into .github/workflows/resume.yml:

on:
  push:
    paths: ["resume.yml"]

jobs:
  publish:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v4
      - uses: actions/setup-go@v5
        with: { go-version: "1.22" }
      - run: go install github.com/ovsec/resumelang@latest
      - run: resumelang build resume.yml --out dist
      - uses: actions/upload-pages-artifact@v3
        with: { path: dist }
      - uses: actions/deploy-pages@v4

Push resume.yml, get a live GitHub Pages site. Every change is a commit. git diff shows exactly what changed.

What's on the roadmap

• Native PDF export (Puppeteer server-side)
• resumelang lint — ATS keyword score, date-gap detection
• LinkedIn import (resumelang import linkedin export.zip)
• AI tailoring — paste a JD, rewrite highlights to match (Pro)
• Link analytics — see when recruiters open your resume (Pro)

Contribute

The theme ecosystem is community-driven. If you have design opinions, the spec is documented at docs.resumelang.dev/themes. Submit a theme, open an issue, or just star the repo.

🔗 resumelang.dev
📖 docs.resumelang.dev
⭐ github.com/ovsec/resumelang

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What would you want from a YAML-first resume tool? Drop it in the comments.