Postcard is now open source

原始链接: https://www.contraption.co/postcard-open-source/

In 2022, Philip Thomas created Postcard, a personal website and newsletter platform, as an alternative to social media. It allowed him to stay connected with friends and power his website, philipithomas.com, where he published monthly updates. Despite modest revenue, Philip continued to maintain Postcard due to his belief in dependable tools. Now, he's open-sourcing Postcard, feeling it's the right move after receiving contribution requests and no longer expecting significant revenue. In the spirit of "vibe coding," he wants to provide a simple, customizable application written in Ruby on Rails. The open-source version includes a new "Solo" mode, simplifying hosting and deployment for single-site users. The original "Multiuser" mode, used for the hosted service, is also included. Deployment is made easy with a Dockerfile and Render configuration file. You can find the code at github.com/contraptionco/postcard.

The Hacker News discussion revolves around Postcard, a newly open-sourced project. A key concern is email deliverability, with users sharing experiences and alternatives to Amazon SES (the default for Postcard) due to approval difficulties. Suggestions included easier SMTP configuration for wider compatibility and control, allowing users to leverage existing email infrastructure and avoid vendor lock-in. Users discuss Postmark and SES, debating which offers better deliverability currently. One user experienced rejections with SES and ended up creating their implementation for use with IMAP/SMTP. Several users also praised the project and the developer for open-sourcing it.

原文

In 2022, I launched Postcard as a personal website + newsletter. I had deleted social media, and wanted a way to stay in touch with friends via email. It powers my personal website, philipithomas.com, where I've published monthly "What I'm up to" every month since.

Postcard's launch was well-received and thousands of people signed up. Today, many people continue to use and maintain their Postcard sites. Revenue is modest - I make dozens of dollars per month on it. But, I'm happy to maintain it because I believe dependable tools matter. Today, I still maintain Postcard and the hosted service runs on a Mac Mini on my desk.

I've decided to release the source code for Postcard. I update the service only occasionally, several developers have asked to contribute, and I no longer expect meaningful revenue from the project. Open-sourcing it feels right.

In the age of vibe coding, I think it would be fun to give people a working app they can customize. Postcard is a fairly simple application, written in Ruby on Rails, that works with few dependencies. So, it should be easy to run and customize.

In order to open-source Postcard, I made some changes to the code. Most significant is that I rewrote the application to support a "Solo" mode for running one single site, which simplifies the hosting and deployment for most open-source users. The hosted service runs in "Multiuser" mode to support multiple users, custom domains, payments, and other options. The codebase includes both modes on the same main branch.

Deployment is straightforward. A Dockerfile is included, and a render.yaml file lets you ship Postcard to Render with minimal setup.

Check it out, fork it, and let me know what you build:

github.com/contraptionco/postcard