LX Draft — User Guide

Version 2026-05-29

A markdown-based word processor that produces polished, branded PDFs.

1.What LX Draft is

LX Draft is a WYSIWYG word processor built on markdown. You write and format your document on a clean, continuous editing canvas, and the artifact you ship is a polished, branded PDF. Think of it as "Word, but markdown-based, and tuned to produce beautiful print-ready documents."

Because the underlying content is markdown, LX Draft is designed to work well with AI agents. An agent can author a precise, well-structured document — a specification, a proposal, a report — in markdown, and a human can then refine it in the editor. Throughout, the PDF is the deliverable: the thing you send to a client, attach to a project, or file as a record.

Writing LX Draft documents with an AI agent back to top ↑

Because LX Draft documents are markdown under the hood, they are often authored by an AI agent. You hand the agent a short writing guide, describe the document you need, and the agent produces a structured .lxdoc (or markdown) file you import here. The guide covers the frontmatter schema, LX-specific extensions (callouts, CSV tables, equations, fields, signatures), how to deliver embedded images as a bundle, and the validation rules your output must pass.

Authoring with an agent? Open the AI Agent Writing Guide, click "Copy this guide" at the top, and paste it into your AI agent as a prompt — the agent will then know exactly how to produce LX Draft documents.

Open the AI Agent Writing Guide

2.Two ways to use LX Draft (Standalone vs Lexis) back to top ↑

This is the most important concept to understand. LX Draft runs in two modes, and a document always knows which mode it belongs to.

Standalone

You open LX Draft directly in your browser and work on a document on your own. Documents are plain .lxdoc files that you open and save on your own computer. There is no project governance: you decide when the document is finished, and you self-sign it on an honour-system basis. This is the "Word, but markdown-based, producing beautiful PDFs" experience.

Lexis-managed

LX Draft can also be launched from Lexis, the project-management suite. In this mode the document is a controlled project artifact. Its lifecycle — releases, version history, and signing — is owned by Lexis, and the document's content lives in the project's Google Drive folder rather than on your computer.

Documents remember their mode. A Lexis-controlled document carries a marker, so it always "knows" it is under Lexis governance. Even if such a document is opened standalone, LX Draft recognises this and defers signing to Lexis rather than letting you self-sign — the controlled lifecycle is respected wherever the document is opened.
Coming soon: standalone Google Drive sign-in. Today, standalone documents save to your local computer. Documents launched from Lexis automatically use Lexis's Google Drive — you don't sign in separately for those.

3.Creating, opening & saving documents back to top ↑

Starting a document

Saving

Use Save to computer (or press Ctrl+S) to write the .lxdoc file.

Recommendation: use Chrome or Edge for true in-place saving.

Recent files

LX Draft keeps a Recent files list so you can jump back into recent work. Note that reopening a local recent file re-prompts the file picker: for your security, the browser does not let a web app silently re-open a file from disk, so you confirm the file each time.

4.Document properties & fields back to top ↑

Every document has a set of properties (stored as front-matter), edited in the Properties panel: title, document number, revision, author, status, classification, and similar metadata.

Insert Field

The Insert Field feature drops a live document-property token into the body of your document — for example, the document number. The token displays the property's current value and updates automatically if you change that property. When you export, the field resolves to its value, so the PDF shows the real number rather than a placeholder. This keeps references like "Document {document-number}, Rev {revision}" always in sync with the properties.

5.Document signing back to top ↑

Standalone signing

Click Sign, type your name, and LX Draft records the signature in the document along with the date. Where a signature field is placed, the signature renders in a cursive font, for example:

Alex Morgan

Edits clear the signature. If you edit the document after signing, the signature is automatically cleared — because the content has changed and a signature should only ever apply to the exact text that was signed. This is detected via the document's integrity hash (see section 7).

Lexis-managed signing

For Lexis-controlled documents, signing uses your authenticated Lexis identity rather than a typed name. The release/version lifecycle in Lexis controls when signatures are locked and when they are cleared, so signing is tied to the formal project record rather than the honour system.

6.Version history & releases (with Lexis) back to top ↑

Standalone

In standalone mode the revision history is a table you maintain by hand. Each entry has a class describing its stage:

ClassMeaning
DraftWork in progress.
ReviewSubmitted for review.
ApprovedReviewed and approved.
ReleasedFormally issued.
ObsoleteSuperseded; no longer current.

Lexis-managed

In Lexis mode the version history reflects actual releases recorded by Lexis — Lexis is the authoritative ledger. Creating a new version in Lexis strips the signing, bumps the revision, and unlocks editing so the next round of work can begin cleanly. You don't maintain the table by hand; it mirrors the real release record.

How revision and signing interact
Lexis-controlled — Lexis owns the lifecycle
Standalone — you self-govern a local file
yes
re-sign
no
start next revision
lexis_controlled: false
lexis_controlled: true
Author / edit content
Sign with your
Lexis identity
→ ACTIVE signature
RELEASE (Lexis)
locks a version,
sets status
NEW VERSION (Lexis)
strips signatures,
bumps revision,
then unlocks editing
Opened outside Lexis:
signing disabled
Author / edit content
Add revision entry,
pick its class
(sets status)
Sign: type your name
→ ACTIVE signature
(captures the hash)
Edit changes
the content?
Signature AUTO-CLEARED
'Document modified…'
(kept in history)
Document created
Draft · v0.1
How is the
document
governed?
Revision and signing are bound together. Standalone, any edit changes the document's integrity hash and automatically clears the signature, so you re-sign. Lexis-controlled, releasing locks a version and cutting a new version deliberately strips the signatures and bumps the revision before editing resumes. Either way, changing the document invalidates its signature.

7.The integrity hash back to top ↑

Every saved document carries a content hash — a fingerprint computed from its contents. This hash underpins two things:

8.Pagination, PDF generation, footnotes & endnotes back to top ↑

One continuous flow while editing

While you edit, the document is a single continuous flow — there are no page boundaries in the editor. This is deliberate: it keeps writing and editing fluid, without text jumping around page breaks as you type.

Pages appear at PDF time

Pagination happens at PDF-generation time. The export engine (PagedJS) flows your content into pages and applies the print furniture:

Footnotes

In the editor, footnotes are collected at the end of the document so they are easy to read and edit in one place. During PDF pagination, each footnote floats to the bottom of the page where its reference appears — proper paged-media footnotes. The reference itself renders as a superscript number in the body text.

Why footnotes look different while editing. On the editing canvas there are no pages, so a footnote can't sit "at the bottom of its page" — there is no page yet. LX Draft therefore gathers footnotes at the end while you edit (convenient), and only at PDF time, once pages exist, does it place each one at the foot of the correct page (correct). It's edit-time convenience versus print-time correctness, by design.

Endnotes

Endnotes are different from footnotes: they are collected together at the very end of the document in the PDF, rather than per page.

9.Exporting back to top ↑

LX Draft can export your document to several formats:

In every export, document-field and signature tokens resolve to their values, so the output shows the real document number, revision, signature, and so on — not the placeholder tokens.

10.Tips & keyboard shortcuts back to top ↑