6 ms·

Show HN: Oracolo – A minimalist Nostr blog in a single HTML file

90 points by dtonon 2y ago

Oracolo is a minimalist blog powered by Nostr, that consists of a single html file, weighing only ~140Kb. It works also without a web server; for example you can send it via email as a business card. Take it as a didactic experiment, it's no production ready, indeed it has some limitations (no SEO friendly structure), but can work as a temporary solution (e.g. coming soon and parking pages), and it is still an example of how easy it is to create a Nostr-powered web app and deploy it on a low-tech infrastructure. Comments and suggestions on how to improve it are welcome!

xd1936 2y ago
I love distributed, server-less hosting concepts. Very cool project idea!
- ollybee 2y ago
  What others do you know of, or is there a resource to find out more?
  - 0x62 2y ago
    You might also be interested in checking out IPFS/IPNS
  - nanomonkey 2y ago
    Off the top of my head: Hypercore (DAT), GUN, Secure Scuttlebutt, IPFS, PPPP, Bamboo, BlueSky, Spritely Goblins... If this is your jam, check out DWeb camp, put on by the Internet Archive, there will be a lot of us decentralized web technologist there.
    - xd1936 2y ago
      Great suggestions. I'd also add that learning how the DHT works is a great jumping off point.
jron 2y ago
I regularly find myself on the internet archive hoping to find a working copy of a page created ten-plus years ago. Page rot, SEO spam, walled gardens, and AI generated nonsense are all converging to suck the value out of the WWW. Projects like this give me a little hope that blogging can make a comeback. NIP-13 [1] also has the ability to use POW to limit bot activity. Thanks for sharing! [1] https://github.com/nostr-protocol/nips/blob/master/13.md https://github.com/nostr-protocol/nips/blob/master/13.md
- troupo 2y ago
  > Projects like this give me a little hope that blogging can make a comeback. From nostr site: "If all the relays that you have used in the past go offline, all your posts will be unretrievable." https://nostr.com/relays https://nostr.com/relays Nostr doesn't solve the archival problem
  - jron 2y ago
    Unlike web scraping where spaghetti logic is required to follow abstracted JS links, archival of nostr events can be as simple as running a relay and mirroring blog content.[1][2] nostr does a lot of what NNTP did but with additional flexibility. [1] https://logperiodic.com/rbsr.html#nostr https://logperiodic.com/rbsr.html#nostr [2] https://github.com/hoytech/strfry/blob/master/docs/negentropy.md https://github.com/hoytech/strfry/blob/master/docs/negentrop...
    - troupo 2y ago
      For that you will need to connect to all relays in existence, right?
      - jron 2y ago
        Users currently tend to push events to massive relays but decentralization is still a goal: https://raw.githack.com/dtonon/oracolo/master/examples/fiatjaf.html#1e950a50c95d11266258912d91ce116380e48b18f3c2c39ec60a42d66cdc3427 https://raw.githack.com/dtonon/oracolo/master/examples/fiatj... https://github.com/nostr-protocol/nips/blob/master/65.md https://github.com/nostr-protocol/nips/blob/master/65.md Still, the short answer to your question would be "yes."
devneelpatel 2y ago
This is amazing! always been a huge fan of nostr.
bogwog 2y ago
Nostr would be so cool if it wasn't associated with bitcoin. I know the protocol has nothing to do with crypto currencies whatsoever, but the people who use it are predominantly in that world. This is a cool project though, so nice job! I'm not sure if a blog is the best use case (regular static blogs are faster and easier), but maybe it would make more sense for other concepts.
- dtonon 2y ago
  Statics blogs are cool but you have to manage them uploading the content every time. The interesting aspect of this solution is that you can use whatever client that supports long format (https://habla.news https://habla.news, https://yakihonne.com https://yakihonne.com, https://highlighter.com https://highlighter.com, etc) to write your post, and your personal blog is automatically updated. No fuss.
blamestross 2y ago
The fact the "I hate NPM" section is so simple makes me wonder why npm was involved at all. I also deeply hate NPM. (Normalizing NPM is a hazard to society) So maybe I'm biased...
- blamestross 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - Capricorn2481 2y ago
    Pip is genuinely worse
- dtonon 2y ago
  I used Svelte for convenience, so you need npm (or equivalent), but only if you want to develop/extend the project. If you just want to use it, the html template is sufficient.
  - blamestross 2y ago
    Honestly it's awesome you did, thanks! Also, please stop using NPM in general.
cynicalsecurity 2y ago
Simple and minimalist => Requires npm ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
- dtonon 2y ago
  Fair objection, but if you don't need to modify the structure/behavior, you can just use the html template file I built for you :)
camgunz 2y ago
I'm doing some NNTP-related work and hadn't looked seriously at Nostr until just now. It looks like the main benefit is just that it signs events, is that right?
- postepowanieadm 2y ago
  And it's extensible.
zoobab 2y ago
Javascript should go to the bin. Writing a JS engine makes it impossible for small players in the web browser market to compete.
jollyjerry 2y ago
This reminds me of Perl's http://www.blosxom.com http://www.blosxom.com and also https://tiddlywiki.com https://tiddlywiki.com. Self-contained sites with minimal requirements.
- karencarits 2y ago
  And the light-weight https://feather.wiki/ https://feather.wiki/ (which is not too different from tiddlywiki)

90 points by dtonon 2y ago

xd1936 2y ago

I love distributed, server-less hosting concepts. Very cool project idea!

ollybee 2y ago
What others do you know of, or is there a resource to find out more?
- 0x62 2y ago
  You might also be interested in checking out IPFS/IPNS
- nanomonkey 2y ago
  Off the top of my head: Hypercore (DAT), GUN, Secure Scuttlebutt, IPFS, PPPP, Bamboo, BlueSky, Spritely Goblins... If this is your jam, check out DWeb camp, put on by the Internet Archive, there will be a lot of us decentralized web technologist there.
  - xd1936 2y ago
    Great suggestions. I'd also add that learning how the DHT works is a great jumping off point.

jron 2y ago

I regularly find myself on the internet archive hoping to find a working copy of a page created ten-plus years ago. Page rot, SEO spam, walled gardens, and AI generated nonsense are all converging to suck the value out of the WWW. Projects like this give me a little hope that blogging can make a comeback. NIP-13 [1] also has the ability to use POW to limit bot activity. Thanks for sharing! [1] https://github.com/nostr-protocol/nips/blob/master/13.md https://github.com/nostr-protocol/nips/blob/master/13.md

troupo 2y ago
> Projects like this give me a little hope that blogging can make a comeback. From nostr site: "If all the relays that you have used in the past go offline, all your posts will be unretrievable." https://nostr.com/relays https://nostr.com/relays Nostr doesn't solve the archival problem
- jron 2y ago
  Unlike web scraping where spaghetti logic is required to follow abstracted JS links, archival of nostr events can be as simple as running a relay and mirroring blog content.[1][2] nostr does a lot of what NNTP did but with additional flexibility. [1] https://logperiodic.com/rbsr.html#nostr https://logperiodic.com/rbsr.html#nostr [2] https://github.com/hoytech/strfry/blob/master/docs/negentropy.md https://github.com/hoytech/strfry/blob/master/docs/negentrop...
  - troupo 2y ago
    For that you will need to connect to all relays in existence, right?
    - jron 2y ago
      Users currently tend to push events to massive relays but decentralization is still a goal: https://raw.githack.com/dtonon/oracolo/master/examples/fiatjaf.html#1e950a50c95d11266258912d91ce116380e48b18f3c2c39ec60a42d66cdc3427 https://raw.githack.com/dtonon/oracolo/master/examples/fiatj... https://github.com/nostr-protocol/nips/blob/master/65.md https://github.com/nostr-protocol/nips/blob/master/65.md Still, the short answer to your question would be "yes."

devneelpatel 2y ago

This is amazing! always been a huge fan of nostr.

bogwog 2y ago

Nostr would be so cool if it wasn't associated with bitcoin. I know the protocol has nothing to do with crypto currencies whatsoever, but the people who use it are predominantly in that world. This is a cool project though, so nice job! I'm not sure if a blog is the best use case (regular static blogs are faster and easier), but maybe it would make more sense for other concepts.

dtonon 2y ago
Statics blogs are cool but you have to manage them uploading the content every time. The interesting aspect of this solution is that you can use whatever client that supports long format (https://habla.news https://habla.news, https://yakihonne.com https://yakihonne.com, https://highlighter.com https://highlighter.com, etc) to write your post, and your personal blog is automatically updated. No fuss.

blamestross 2y ago

The fact the "I hate NPM" section is so simple makes me wonder why npm was involved at all. I also deeply hate NPM. (Normalizing NPM is a hazard to society) So maybe I'm biased...

blamestross 2y ago
[flagged]
- Capricorn2481 2y ago
  Pip is genuinely worse
dtonon 2y ago
I used Svelte for convenience, so you need npm (or equivalent), but only if you want to develop/extend the project. If you just want to use it, the html template is sufficient.
- blamestross 2y ago
  Honestly it's awesome you did, thanks! Also, please stop using NPM in general.

cynicalsecurity 2y ago

Simple and minimalist => Requires npm ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

dtonon 2y ago
Fair objection, but if you don't need to modify the structure/behavior, you can just use the html template file I built for you :)

camgunz 2y ago

I'm doing some NNTP-related work and hadn't looked seriously at Nostr until just now. It looks like the main benefit is just that it signs events, is that right?

postepowanieadm 2y ago
And it's extensible.

zoobab 2y ago

Javascript should go to the bin. Writing a JS engine makes it impossible for small players in the web browser market to compete.

jollyjerry 2y ago

This reminds me of Perl's http://www.blosxom.com http://www.blosxom.com and also https://tiddlywiki.com https://tiddlywiki.com. Self-contained sites with minimal requirements.

karencarits 2y ago
And the light-weight https://feather.wiki/ https://feather.wiki/ (which is not too different from tiddlywiki)