Kommentator first release
Howdy.
After being disappointed with current comment systems for static websites I decided to develop very lightweight open source comment system for static websites. Today I am really happy to announce first pre-alpha version, so, without further ado, here it is:
Kommentator
Kommentator is open source, lightweight, dependency-free comments system for websites. Main focus are static websites or blogs, but it can be used on any website. Goals of this project: provide a hassle-free way to enable commenting on your blog/website so you can carry on with your life and blogging. You can start Kommentator once, forget about its existence and start enjoying engagement with your audience. To reach these goals, following tech stack was chosen:
- Go language. Very lightweight language which is compiled to static binary for different platforms. It means that you do not need to worry about dependencies, runtime environments, or anything else. All you need is single binary.
- SQLite database for storage. Very tiny but very performant and stable in-process SQL database. It does not have separate server you need to worry about, database is embedded into the same process. One less dependency to manage, one more free hour a month to spend with your loved ones instead.
- Hyperapp 1Kb frontend library to build HTML apps. This project is amazing, it provides 1 Kilobyte library, which you can think of as very basic REACT. You got a lot of same benefits: one way data flow, virtual DOM, very quick UI updates for only 1 KB.
- Recaptcha Internet is not a fairyland filled with highly thought-through comments from people are humble to post links to their resources. It is filled with bots who are just looking where to spam. ReCAPTCHA provides protection against them without getting in a way of legitimate users. Now, ReCAPTCHA uses around 150-200kb of JS to function, which goes against main goals of Kommentator, to solve this dilemma, ReCAPTCHA scripts are only loaded after used press “send” button.
It is also important to notice what Kommentator is not:
- It is not a social network, it is not designed to have its own user base (at least for now)
- It does not look to monetize users or their data: all data belongs to you
Today I have released version 0.1.1 which I would encourage everybody to try. Note that it is not production ready yet, it is not even “alpha” release, but it has basic functionality. In fact, it is being used on this very page.
So, try it out. See how it goes.
Oh and yes, leave a comment below!