WHNVR

A place to scream into the void socially.

This is an open source project built using OCaml for the server, Htmx for the templates, and Petrol for Database management.

Ultimately, this project is a proof-of-concept OCaml app that I took from beginning (knowing no OCaml) to production deployment. At the core, WHNVR wants to be a simple messaging service, not unlike many other social networks, but with a goal of providing people with a place to anonymously state things they may not be comfortably just saying otherwise. All messages are designed to live only 24 hours, before the database drops them. Users are not able to use passwords in the conventional sense because we believe that passwords are fundamentally flawed. Instead, WHNVR opts to use passphrases, and eventually passkeys, which gives a user the ability to interact without the pain of remembering the street they lived on when they were 7 years old. WHNVR does not cater to influencers because you have no followers. Every person, every message, every thought can be evaluated for what it is, rather than who is saying it. You don't know if 5 people or 5 million people are seeking out the messages you read. This should urge the common reader to enjoy but investigate - take nothing at face value.

Development Setup

Step 1: Database

Currently the only tested database is PostgreSQL, but in theory SQLite should work as well.

WHNVR leverages a .env file to populate secrets (because we aren't barbarians). You will need to set the following environment variables in .env or via direct export before starting WHNVR:

• DB_HOST -> The host of the database instance
• DB_PORT -> The port that the database is using
• DB_NAME -> The name of the database
• DB_PASS -> the password of the database user
• DB_USER -> The username of the database user

Step 2: Tailwind

This project uses tailwind, but does not install it via npm. You may choose to do so, but the preferred solution is to download the Tailwind CLI and run it that way.

With the Tailwind CLI, you will use www/static/global.css as the input and www/static/build.css as the output like so:

./tailwindcss -i www/static/global.css -o www/static/build.css --watch

The --watch flag will keep the process running and update the CSS in the background as you swap tailwind classes in and out.

Step 3: Dune

You can start WHNVR via dune:

dune exec whnvr

This will start the app on port 8080.

I am playing with Dune rules at the moment to use bun to generate a build version of my various JS files that I use to invoke passkey functions. the stanze (deps (universe)) in the base dune file ensures that the rule is always run, even if it is not necessary. It may be removed at a later time to allow dune to skip build steps that are unnecessary.

ESBuild

In order to build the limited JS code we use, we need to run a bundler. This is important for leveraging the Beyond Identity JS SDK. In order to do that, you can run

node esbuild.config.mjs

And it will start a process in the background that will catch changes to any scripts. NOTE: You will need to add any new scripts you introduce to this config, so that the bundler will actually pick it up.