TrailFed

Federated geo-social protocol for travellers.

TrailFed is an open-source, ActivityPub-based protocol and reference server for people on the move: van-lifers, overlanders, sailors, cyclists, anglers, hikers and digital nomads. Each instance is self-hosted and federates places of interest (POI), check-ins and travel tracks with trusted peers — the Mastodon model applied to travel.

Status: Phase 0 — not production ready. See docs/roadmap.md.

Why

Today travellers juggle 5–7 closed platforms (Park4Night, iOverlander, Campendium, Polarsteps, Navily…), each owning its own silo of reviews and locations. TrailFed provides a shared federation layer so that:

• Any community can run its own instance — vanlife, fishing, motorbike touring, sea-faring — and still exchange data with allied peers.
• Your data lives where you do. No centralised operator to shut you down or sell your location history.
• OpenStreetMap stays primary for base geography; TrailFed adds the human layer on top — reviews, ephemeral amenities, check-ins, travel stories.

5-minute quickstart (dev)

git clone https://github.com/trailfed/trailfed.git
cd trailfed
cp .env.example .env
docker compose up -d postgres
DATABASE_URL=postgres://trailfed:trailfed_dev_only@localhost:5432/trailfed \
  pnpm --filter @trailfed/server migrate
docker compose up

Open http://localhost:8090. A stub WebFinger responder lives at /.well-known/webfinger.

Database migrations are applied explicitly via pnpm --filter @trailfed/server migrate (Drizzle), not on server boot. Schema lives in server/src/db/schema.ts; SQL migrations under server/src/db/migrations/.

To get a real map instead of the MapLibre demo basemap, drop a regional PMTiles file into infra/pmtiles/ — see infra/pmtiles/README.md for the Cyprus quick-start.

See docs/deployment.md for production.

Documentation

• Vision — what we're building and why
• Positioning — how TrailFed compares to existing solutions
• Architecture overview
• Tech stack
• Federation spec — ActivityPub + geo extensions
• OSM integration — ODbL-compliant import/export
• Privacy model
• Roadmap — seven phases to v1.0
• Architecture decisions — ADRs

Contributing

We follow a DCO sign-off flow (no CLA). See CONTRIBUTING.md.

Good first issues are labelled good-first-issue. All participants must follow the Code of Conduct.

License

TrailFed is licensed under the GNU Affero General Public License v3.0 or later. This protects the project from closed-source SaaS forks while remaining compatible with the ActivityPub ecosystem.

Security

Please do not file public issues for security vulnerabilities. See SECURITY.md.