this post was submitted on 10 Feb 2026
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GitHub - spacebarchat/spacebarchat: πŸ“¬ Spacebar is a free open source selfhostable discord compatible communication platform (github.com)
submitted 5 hours ago by moonpiedumplings@programming.dev to c/selfhosted@lemmy.world
35 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

Has anyone tried this? It's discord reverse engineered.

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[–] wreckedcarzz@lemmy.world 22 points 3 hours ago* (last edited 3 hours ago) (2 children)

I set this container up yesterday. Technically it's running. But all the settings are in the fucking sql db, and I know fuck all about sql other than drop tables is funny meme from xkcd. But also, ignoring the settings, I would like to point out that there is effectively no client. I mean, there are two official ones - the depreciated one, and the alpha one, and the alpha one has a total of 4 releases with the newest being two years ago. How do you deprecate a client when the server is still in alpha? What the fuck? And on all pages it screams 'this is alpha testing software, do not use as a daily'. Also the docs are, uhh... rough. If rough was falling 4 stories into a bed of poisonous cacti. It took me 3 hours to get the container running properly and finally poking at the db. It's as organized as my bedroom ('it's somewhere in this dresser, I think...').

The idea, the potential, is brilliant. Literally everything about getting it working though...

[–] paraphrand@lemmy.world 12 points 2 hours ago (1 children)

Lots of great software ideas out there. It’s always the execution, availability of resources, and the reality of capitalism getting in the way.

[–] 30p87@feddit.org 1 points 7 minutes ago

Until I get in the way of capitalism (with a shotgun)

[–] Neptr@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 2 hours ago* (last edited 2 hours ago) (1 children)

You can use the WebCord app for Spacebar.

[–] wreckedcarzz@lemmy.world 1 points 22 minutes ago* (last edited 22 minutes ago)

I don't see any options or mention of changing instances, beyond discord canary and public testing...? I might be blind

[–] jjlinux@lemmy.zip 7 points 2 hours ago (1 children)

3 years of abandonment? Absolutely not.

[–] SleveMcDichael@programming.dev 4 points 2 hours ago

Where are you getting three years of abandonment from? The branding repo OP linked was last updated 10 months ago, while the server repo appears to have had pretty steady development for the last month at least (as far back as I bothered checking on mobile)

[–] Comrade_Spood@quokk.au 2 points 1 hour ago (2 children)

This wont go anywhere until they have an app that is easy to download. And then everyone says Revolt/Stoat but that doesnt even fucking work cause their verification system is ass (probably because they use gen AI to code) and also is difficult to download the mobile app

[–] em2@lemmy.ml 1 points 37 minutes ago

Their verification system has been my boss fight the last 48 hours. I want to get off of discord. PLEASE LET ME!

[–] Truscape@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 1 hour ago (1 children)

Stoat has 3rd party clients that are easy to install, I already got the Clerotri app downloaded directly from Accrescent on GrapheneOS (although I believe they have an F-Droid release).

[–] Comrade_Spood@quokk.au 2 points 1 hour ago* (last edited 1 hour ago) (1 children)

Still has AI generated code. I tried setting up an account and despite it saying the email to verify your account would take up to 10 minutes, it actually would take hours. And I can't sign up with my proton email (managed to get it to work with my gmail), while my friend cant get it to verify with their gmail.

Edit: Also have I have not found clients on fdroid or aurora store. I could only find the old Revolt app by adding its own fdroid repository and it hasnt been updated in years

[–] Truscape@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 1 hour ago* (last edited 1 hour ago)

Ah on the storefront side, sorry. I made an educated guess, but I guess it's not a good one XD.

Here is the Stoat/Revolt wiki with a complete list of clients (official and 3rd party) that you can check btw: https://wiki.rvlt.gg/index.php/Stoat_Clients

I wasn't aware of the AI-generated code part, I'll take a look at source to verify.

[–] CoreLabJoe@piefed.ca 37 points 4 hours ago (4 children)

HHhhmm... Do container/docker install option. This is why it's probably stagnated in adoption from the selfhosted community.

It needs a container based install, no one likes installing dependencies and crud onto their pristine environments any longer.

[–] 30p87@feddit.org 1 points 9 minutes ago

I do. I just completed pulling the core piped components (piped-backend, -frontend and -prox as well as -html-proxy) from Docker to native installs from the AUR, as well as installing searxng without a venv. Spacebar (the server and client) even have AUR pkgs, but they're unmaintained... I'm gonna change that.

[–] irmadlad@lemmy.world 7 points 2 hours ago

no one likes installing dependencies and crud onto their pristine environments any longer

It just depends, however, containers sure do make things a lot cleaner.

[–] tofu@lemmy.nocturnal.garden 20 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

It's just not mentioned prominently https://github.com/spacebarchat/docker

[–] hexagonwin@lemmy.today 14 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

last commit 3yrs ago.. seems unmaintained

[–] moonpiedumplings@programming.dev 44 points 4 hours ago* (last edited 1 hour ago) (2 children)

Docker compose's don't really need to be maintained though. As long as the app doesn't need new components old docker composes should work.

EDIT: Oops, it does look like spacebarchat's docker images have last been updated over 2 years ago:

https://hub.docker.com/r/spacebarchat/server

EDIT2: Although this is outdated, I think their github repo has an action to autobuild docker images on pushes. Still investigating.

EDIT3: Okay, they don't seem to be actually ran.

But using nix to build a docker image is pretty cool.

EDIT4: Oh shit, the docker image build workflows were added just 2 hours ago. Of course they haven't been ran!

Docker support soon, probably.

EDIT5: the workflow ran, but it looks like it's private for now.

[–] Railcar8095@lemmy.world 33 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

You got my heart racing with the twists!

[–] Onomatopoeia@lemmy.cafe 9 points 3 hours ago

Right? Reading that was like watching an action movie!

[–] rudyharrelson@lemmy.radio 7 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

Perhaps more relevantly, the Docker image itself has not been updated in over 2 years: https://hub.docker.com/r/spacebarchat/server

[–] moonpiedumplings@programming.dev 6 points 4 hours ago

Faster than my edits, I see.

[–] Semi_Hemi_Demigod@lemmy.world 12 points 4 hours ago

It’s weird that the server has a .dockerignore file without a Dockerfile.

[–] scrubbles@poptalk.scrubbles.tech 8 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

Decentralized (no abuse of power and doesn't have a single point of failure)

There is a direct server though, is it federated? The readme doesn't say it's federated at all

[–] moonpiedumplings@programming.dev 6 points 4 hours ago (2 children)

It's not federated, just easy to self host and point custom clients at.

[–] scrubbles@poptalk.scrubbles.tech 2 points 3 hours ago

That's too bad, that's a hard line for me, it has to have the option of federation.

Also, so it's a direct server, so it is centralized, there's nothing decentralized about it

[–] Lumisal@lemmy.world 2 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

Are you sure? Because they also seem to be behind Fermi which sounds federated

[–] moonpiedumplings@programming.dev 2 points 2 hours ago

Fermi is just a custom client for discord/spacebar. It's not federated.

[–] ulkesh@piefed.social 3 points 3 hours ago

Doesn't seem terribly well-maintained.

[–] nfreak@lemmy.ml 6 points 4 hours ago (3 children)

Interesting, seems like this has been around for a while but I haven't heard of it until now. With how much Discord's shitting the fan and becoming (well, always has been) a privacy nightmare, this seems worth a try. The alternatives out there either need time to mature (Stoat) or don't really fill the same role (Matrix).

[–] lemming@anarchist.nexus 7 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

shitting the fan

Huh, like a more disastrous and direct combo-approach. I like it.

[–] nfreak@lemmy.ml 3 points 2 hours ago

You know I didn't even realize I said this and I'm gonna start using this one LMFAO

[–] Lemmchen@feddit.org 5 points 4 hours ago* (last edited 4 hours ago)

Spacebar was called Fosscord before. Maybe you have heard of that.

[–] mrnobody@reddthat.com 4 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

Never heard of it either. Will check out cuz initially sounded like some vibecode app to quickly replace Discord since the news.

[–] wreckedcarzz@lemmy.world 2 points 3 hours ago

It's been around a few years. I investigated it last year. It had a name change some times ago.

I can't vouch for the code quality, but it's too old to be slop.