Storybook Cheat Sheet

Storybook cheat sheet with real commands and snippets for setup, core workflows, debugging, and production-safe automation patterns. If you are working across tools, pair this with the Svelte Cheat Sheet and Vue Cheat Sheet.

Setup and Installation

Goal: Create a fresh project

# Scaffold project using official starter
npm create vite@latest storybook-demo -- --template react-ts

# Install dependencies after scaffold completes
cd storybook-demo && npm install && npx storybook@latest init

Goal: Verify local toolchain versions

# Print Node.js runtime version
node --version

# Print npm version for lockfile consistency
npm --version

# Inspect package scripts in project
cat package.json | rg "scripts" -n

Core Development Workflow

Goal: Run local development server

# Start framework dev server with hot reload
npm run storybook

# Check local endpoint health
curl -I http://localhost:3000 || curl -I http://localhost:5173 || true

Goal: Build and preview production output

# Build optimized production assets
npm run build-storybook

# Run production preview server
npx http-server storybook-static -p 6006

Goal: Implement a core feature snippet

// Storybook story for a Button component
import type { Meta, StoryObj } from '@storybook/react';
import { Button } from './Button';

const meta: Meta<typeof Button> = { component: Button };
export default meta;

export const Primary: StoryObj<typeof Button> = { args: { label: 'Save' } };

Testing and Quality

Goal: Run tests and static checks

# Execute project tests
npm test

# Run type checking when available
npm run check || npx tsc --noEmit || true

# Run linting for fast feedback
npm run lint || true

Deployment and Operations

Goal: Prepare deployment artifacts

# Create production build before deployment
npm run build-storybook

# Validate environment variables are set
node -e "console.log('NODE_ENV=', process.env.NODE_ENV || 'unset')"

# Smoke-test production route after deploy
curl -I https://devcheatsheets.com

Debugging and Troubleshooting

Goal: Inspect build and runtime failures

# Reinstall dependencies from lockfile
rm -rf node_modules && npm ci

# Re-run build with clean cache
npm run build

# Search source for suspect route/config patterns
rg "route|middleware|config" src app -n

Common Gotchas

• Run Storybook builds locally before shipping to CI/CD environments.
• Keep environment secrets outside the repository and load them per environment.
• Avoid stale dependency locks by using npm ci in automation.
• Validate route and middleware behavior with explicit smoke tests.
• Keep framework and plugin versions aligned to avoid build regressions.

Related Sheets

• Svelte Cheat Sheet — daily Svelte commands and production-ready examples.
• Vue Cheat Sheet — daily Vue commands and production-ready examples.
• tmux Cheat Sheet — daily tmux commands and production-ready examples.