Open-sourced A/SIDE, a private social app for close friends
Hello r/DigitalEscapeTools,
I open-sourced A/SIDE after sharing the hosted app and getting curiosity about the implementation.
It is a private photo, video, text, and messaging app for people you actually know. By invitation, double opt-in, strictly chronological. No public profiles, no discovery tab, no follower-count game, no ads, no algorithmic feed, E2E encrypted DMs with Signal Protocol, no analytics SDK, and no training on user content. The hosted version is not even on a hyperscaler cloud.
What it does today:
Posts: photo, video, carousel, and text-only posts with captions, comments, likes, emoji reactions, and optional hide-after-24h posts.
Composer: film-stock style photo filters, B&W presets, adjustable grain, per-image filters across carousels, crop/straighten/rotate, drag-to-reorder carousel photos, and recoverable drafts.
Feed: posts from mutual follows only, newest first. You can filter the feed by private Lists like family, climbing crew, book club, etc.
Comments and reactions: one reply level, comment likes, mentions, edit/delete, edited indicators, heart likes, and any-emoji reaction chips.
Connections: invite codes/links, mutual-only follows, follow requests through mutuals, inbound/outbound request views, and contact matching via phone hashes instead of plaintext contact uploads.
Messages: real-time 1:1 and group chats, unread counts, photo/video/text messages, encrypted messages and image attachments, generic push bodies, and identity-change warnings.
Mobile extras: screenshot policy reminder, on-device speech-to-text where supported, iOS share extension, iOS home-screen photo widget, and native sharing for your own posts.
Repo includes the Flutter iOS/Android client, Node/Express/Postgres backend, Rust crypto bridge, Signal Protocol integration, tests, Docker local dev setup, and self-hosting notes.
License is AGPL-3.0.
Repo: https://github.com/A-SIDE-Social/aside
Hosted app: https://a-side.social