Cryogen aims to be as simple as possible. There's no need to set up a database or jump through hoops just to get a boilerplate template going.
To get started, you'll need to have either Leiningen or Clojure CLI with clj-new as a tool. Once you have that ready, here's how to get the base template.
# Clj-new
~ $ clojure -Ttools install com.github.seancorfield/clj-new '{:git/tag "v1.2.362"}' :as clj-new
# Leiningen:
~ $ lein new cryogen my-blog
~ $ cd my-blog
# start continuous build that watches for changes
~/my-blog $ lein serve # or lein serve:fast
# build for deployment
~ $ lein run
# Clojure CLI (after installing clj-new as a tool - see link above)):
~ $ clojure -Tclj-new create :template cryogen :name me.my-blog
~ $ cd me.my-blog
# start continuous build that watches for changes
~/my-blog $ clojure -X:serve # or clojure -X:serve:fast
# build for deployment
~ $ clojure -M:build
Once the server starts, you can visit your site at localhost:3000*. The first thing you'll see is a helpful README on what to do next.
*) You can override the default port by setting the env variable PORT: env PORT=8080 lein serve