#LocalFirst — Bluesky Posts

1 day ago

You're lying in bed replaying something you said three years ago. Your phone could help you process that. Instead it's showing you what someone else had for lunch.

Meos is just a quiet place for your own thoughts. getmeos.com

#privacy #localfirst

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1 day ago

You gave your journal to a company that sells ads.

Not on purpose. You just needed somewhere to write. And the default was someone else's server, someone else's terms, someone else's business model wrapped around your most private thoughts.

We normalised that. All of us.

#privacy #localfirst

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1 day ago

You wrote something at 2am that you'd never say out loud. It's still the truest thing in your phone.

Meos keeps it on your device, not someone's server. getmeos.com

#privacy #localfirst

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1 day ago

You unlocked your phone 96 times today. How many of those were for you?

Meos is the one that's yours. getmeos.com

#privacy #localfirst

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Release v01.01.00 · Chadders13/SheepCat-TrackingMyWork SheepCat v01.01.00 Released: 2026-03-12 📋 Other Changes Add custom prompt context settings for interval and daily summaries; restore default check-in interval to 60 min (#33) Full Changelog: See...

2 days ago

Still 100% local, totally private, and strictly cloud-free. ☁️🚫
Grab the v01.01.00 release and check out the updated code here:
github.com/Chadders13/S...
#OpenSource #Python #BuildInPublic #LocalFirst #Neurodivergent #DeveloperTools

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@alsuren.mastodon.me.uk.ap.brid.gy

3 days ago

You journal at 2am because that's when the truth comes out. Then you close the app and it's gone... buried under groceries and meeting notes by morning.

Meos remembers what 2am you was trying to say. getmeos.com

#privacy #localfirst

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David Laban

3 days ago

A Love Letter to Grist My previous company was called Opvia. It was basically Notion, but with stronger guarantees around audit logging and version management, so it was easier to sell into regulated industries. I was pretty proud of a lot of the things I built there, but I wasn’t so okay with the perverse incentives that come with being a SaaS system of record company. Specifically, I was haunted by the question “are we sticky with our customers because we make their lives better than using excel, or are we sticky because once you’ve spent all this time getting data into the system in a nice relational way, and it’s a massive pain to get the data out again?” After leaving Opvia, I wanted to make something that did all of the same stuff but without the data lock-in and perverse incentives that we had. I had stumbled across the local-first movement, and all the crazy things people were doing with SQLite. In my vision, I wanted something that worked like Excel from my childhood (where you pass around .xls files) but each file contained the whole database. I decided that I would solve the multiplayer story using something like cr-sqlite, and was blissfully naive about the conflict resolution piece. I suppose what I was building in my head was Microsoft Access. Recently, I was browsing around the EMF Camp site and stumbled upon Grist. It is open source and uses sqlite as the file format. I think this is basically what I would have built at the end of that summer, if I was not in danger of running out of money. I suddenly became really excited about this, and told everyone who would listen. It is basically Airtable, but open source and with data sovereignty. Each column directly maps to a column in an sqlite database, and each row to a row. There are a few reserved metadata tables for configuring widgets and views, but if you fetch the .grist file from the cloud server (or grist-static) then you can open it in the sqlite3 CLI and `select * from mytable` will do exactly what you expect. In the last few years I have gone all in on sqlite and local-first (including going to Local-First Conf in Berlin and the local-first devroom at FOSDEM, and even joining the D1 managed sqlite database team at Cloudflare). I was surprised not to see more hype from Grist around local-first. I had stumbled across grist-static (which is a fully in-browser version of Grist that can be hosted on GitHub Pages). I assumed that they were probably doing pretty well against most of the local-first ideals from the paper: ### 1. No spinners: your work at your fingertips If grist-static exists then surely everything can be done in the browser completely offline, right? The future looks like it could be pulled in this direction, but unfortunately that is not the primary architecture right now. As it stands, when you open a Grist document, it fetches the sqlite file from S3 into a server and starts a Python sandbox to serve the backend for your database. If you lose connection then it will show a toast for a second telling you it is in read-only mode before it reconnects. 10 out of 10 for grist-static, but 0 out of 10 for grist-proper. ### 2. Your work is not trapped on one device Everything is done on the server, but you can access it from anywhere and the format that the server stores your work in is the same sqlite .grist file format that you are given when you download the database for local use. 10 out of 10. ### 3. The network is optional 8 out of 10 for grist-static but 0 out of 10 for grist-proper. See point 1. ### 4. Seamless collaboration with your colleagues I haven’t been using grist to collaborate with anyone so far, but it has public projects and you can invite people to your team. They even have a fork and merge ui, which I’m looking for an excuse to play with. Grist also got a bunch of contributions from the French government, so I expect it to work reasonably well for government department sized teams. If I could change anything here, I would make it easier to export a .grist file, edit it in some external program and then use the fork and merge ui to compare changes before overwriting the original on the server. It currently defaults to creating a new document, which is _technically_ nondestructive, but not very satisfying if you have public links that point into the original and you don’t want to break them by archiving it. I get that this kind of reconciliation problem is _extremely hard_ , and an area of ongoing research. I also understand that getting it wrong can be _disastrous_ , so I understand why they’ve done it like they have. A boy can dream though, right? 0 out of 10 for grist-static but 9 out of 10 for grist-proper. ### 5. The Long Now This is the whole fucking deal. I can’t emphasize this enough. This is important especially right now, and especially for people who paid attention in history class. When I got bitten by the local-first bug during my summer after Opvia, it felt like going back to my Freedesktop roots. People were taking principled stances on things, and talking about certain ideals in the same way that Free Software people talk about certain freedoms. This ideal is the place where the two communities overlap. So how does Grist do here? Grist’s backing store and interchange format are .grist files. These are sqlite databases under the hood, which is what your browser uses, and also most iphone and android apps. The sqlite file format is basically infrastructure at this point, and grist uses it in a way that I would have never dreamed of when I was working at Opvia. A .grist file’s database structure closely mirrors what you see in the UI (with some extra book-keeping tables off on the side). Whenever you make a change to your table structure, grist runs ALTER TABLE on the sqlite database to make the change. This means that you can drop into the sqlite3 cli or tableplus and do _whatever you want_ to the underlying data without any grist-specific tooling in sight, and without any fear of data getting silently omitted in the export process. For a multi-tenant system running on top of postgres, this would be unheard of. Really nice. To give another comparison, the other local-first Notion clone that I tried out in my summer off was AFFiNE. It can also run entirely in the browser, and has an offline-capable CRDT-based sync engine. On the surface of it, .grist files and .affine files are both sqlite databases, but .affine’s tables are just a bunch of opaque binary CRDT nonsense. I would not expect to be able to edit a .affine file in any tool other than affine itself. AFFiNE is AGPL licensed, so in theory you can keep it going in the long now. I don’t expect anyone to build a hosting business around it if affine folds though. When I tried to contribute to it, their issue tracker was in a closed linear project, and it was an uphill struggle because I couldn’t see whether my contributions were aligned with their vision at all. It seems like their github issue tracker is more active now, so maybe that changed since then. Grist’s core is Apache licensed. This is a solid license that smells like Internet Infrastructure. Issues are public, and there are a bunch of contributions from external organisations, including the french government. 10 out of 10. ### 6. Security and privacy by default I was in the radical openness camp until Facebook made that deeply unfashionable. I used to keep a public trello board of all of my project ideas (which at some point got moved to airtable and then maybe affine before being abandoned). I’m now I’m starting to build that up again in grist (one day I will build a kanban view that I actually like, I promise). I also have a private database for tracking house things that I share only with people I live with. I do not expect to be served adverts about the contents of either of these databases. Grist also has some fancy row level security things that are enforced server-side, but fundamentally the server needs to be able to read the whole database, and retrofitting end to end encryption into the thing would be quite tricky. [Note: when I shared this post with folks on the grist discord, they mentioned that grist started out as a desktop app with end-to-end encrypted sync. You can still feel those roots in a bunch of places, even though the architecture has changed a lot since then.] 7 out of 10? ### 7. You retain ultimate ownership and control I fundamentally trust Grist to act in my interests more than I trust Airtable or Notion. The fact that a self hosted version is just a single docker command away, and the statically hosted version is so capable, gives me confidence that I will be able to eject onto fly.io if I need to. I would love to say Durable Objects here, but the lack of ability to fetch/post the underlying sqlite backing store for a Durable Object makes some things hard. One thing to note is that widgets are basically iframes, and can point basically anywhere. I didn’t mention it in The Long Now, but I wonder if there might be some scope for golang-style caching proxies, or even a system for vendoring widgets into your .grist file (grist has a jsfiddle-like UI for authoring widgets if you want, and they do get stored in the .grist file). Honestly though, if I lose a couple of widgets over the decades, but my data is in the shape that **I** specified in the UI, it won’t be much work to build replacements. Bonus: if you consider Grist widgets to be apps and Grist to be some data infrastructure/container then maybe it is already approaching the vision that Orion Reed is describing in this post. 10 out of 10 again. ## Conclusion I would not say that Grist has all of the local-first ideals nailed. I don’t think anyone does. I realised as I was using it that the data sovereignty piece is the one that I really care about though, and that is why I am all in on Grist at the moment. I would much rather have Grist with its long-now-proof sqlite storage than AFFiNE with its magical real time sync engine and no trust that I will be able to get my data out in 10 years time.

I finally got around to picking up the blog again: alsuren.github.io/2026/03/09/a-love-letter...

#grist #localfirst #sqlite

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4 days ago

You wrote something honest at 2am and by morning it was already training someone else's model.

Meos keeps your thoughts on your device. No account. No extraction. Just yours.

getmeos.com

#privacy #localfirst

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4 days ago

You don't need a system. You need a place to think without performing.

Meos doesn't organise you. It just... listens.

getmeos.com

#privacy #localfirst

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4 days ago

When was the last time you wrote something just for yourself... and knew no one would ever read it?

Meos exists for that. getmeos.com

#privacy #localfirst

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4 days ago

More Ai ???? Or more themes ?

So Ai idea review previous days and get insights or helpful notes for today ?

Or

Make pink and black old school limewire theme ?

#feedback #poll #OpenSource #Python #BuildInPublic #LocalFirst #DeveloperTools #limewire

4 1 2 0

5 days ago

A cozy cartoon illustration of a home office at night, filled with string lights, plants, and computer monitors. In the foreground, a cat mascot wearing a fluffy ram hoodie (SheepCat) smiles warmly and waves. Next to SheepCat, a holographic hexagonal portal, labeled "FEEDBACK WELCOME PORTAL // #DONTBESHY," displays floating icons and text bubbles: "BUG REPORT!", "FEATURE IDEA?", "TWEAK UX?", "Add more dark themes?", and "Love the Gentle approach!". Behind the desk, a user with curly hair sits with their back turned, using multiple monitors that show code editors, a Jira board, and the purple SheepCat interface. The infographic includes several text banners: Top Banner: "WE WANT YOUR FEEDBACK! // HELP SHAPE THE GENTLE REVOLUTION" Middle Left: "SHARE BUGS, IDEAS, CRITIQUES #LOCALFIRST #DEVELOPERTOOLS" and "GENTLE WORK TRACKER (v01.00.03)" Cat's Thought Bubble: "No feedback is too small! Share it." Bottom Left (on a giant holographic cat paw): "TELL US WHAT YOU DON'T LIKE! #DONTBESHY #BUILDINPUBLIC" Sticky Note on Monitor: "Rethink nudge wording?" Footer: "LOCAL AI // ZERO CLOUD SYNC // 100% PRIVATE // 🐍 PYTHON" (accompanied by the Python logo).

If anyone has had chance to try it and there something you don't like feedback is most welcomed

#dontbeshy #opensource #BuildInPublic #LocalFirst #DeveloperTools #feedback

5 0 0 0

5 days ago

Strange that we call it a "phone" when it's mostly a machine for other people's priorities.

Meos is the opposite. A quiet place on your device where the only voice is yours.

getmeos.com

#privacy #localfirst

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5 days ago

You journal at 2am because that's when the mask comes off.

Meos keeps those words on your phone, not someone else's server. getmeos.com

#privacy #localfirst

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Release 01.00.03 · Chadders13/SheepCat-TrackingMyWork SheepCat v01.00.03 Released: 2026-03-09 📋 Other Changes Merge hourly check-in prompt and Todo list prompt into a single dialog (#32) Add Classic and Glass Purple UI theme choices with rounded glas...

5 days ago

You can check out the updated code or grab the latest release right here:
github.com/Chadders13/S...
#OpenSource #Python #BuildInPublic #LocalFirst #DeveloperTools

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Simon Späti 🏔️

@ssp.sh

5 days ago

Rill | Building an Agent-Friendly, Local-First Analytics Stack with MotherDuck and Rill The convergence of embedded analytics engines (DuckDB/MotherDuck), declarative BI-as-code (Rill), and AI agent protocols (MCP) is creating a new architecture for business intelligence, one where dashb...

CLI-first is eating development. Email, calendar—they all have CLIs now. Why not your business metrics?

For data/analytics engineers building with agents: DuckDB + MotherDuck + Rill give you an #agentfriendly, #localfirst frontend—exact context via SQL and YAML.

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6 days ago

Meos doesn't organise your thoughts. It just sits with them.

#privacy #localfirst

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Beyond the Installer: A look at everything SheepCat can do (and what you've all been sayin — Andrew Chadwick Post by Andrew Chadwick

6 days ago

Hey want to know a little more about our work tracker and support us check out some of our blog posts

buymeacoffee.com/chadders13h/...

#bmac #opensource #Python #Dyslexia #Neurodivergent #LocalFirst #BuildInPublic #LocalAI

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1 week ago

An infographic titled "Shaping Software for Neurodivergent Brains" comparing two styles of work tracking side-by-side. On the left, "Traditional Tracking (Nightmare)" shows a stressed, shadow-like developer slumped at a desk, overwhelmed by a giant red stopwatch labeled "Stopwatch Anxiety," cluttered software interfaces, and demanding pop-ups requiring categorization, resulting in a warning sign for "Drained Executive Function." On the right, "SheepCat: Gentle Approach & Cognitive Ergonomics" shows a cozy, warmly lit desk. The SheepCat mascot—an orange cat wearing a fluffy white sheep hoodie and holding a glowing digital sword—stands happily. Above it, a quiet pop-up reads "Polite & Dismissable Nudge." A window labeled "Raw Thought Dump (Dyslexia Friendly)" shows messy, misspelled text ("figthin sql conections agian...") feeding into a glowing brain icon representing Local AI (Ollama). The AI processes the mess and outputs a perfectly formatted, professional "Standup Report." Text across the bottom reads: "Local AI // Zero Cloud Sync // 100% Private // Python" next to a Python logo.

It's time for work trackers to work for you not against you

github.com/Chadders13/S...

#OpenSource #Python #Dyslexia #Neurodivergent #LocalFirst #BuildInPublic #LocalAI

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1 week ago

Funny how your phone knows your face, your fingerprint, your location, your heartbeat. But not a single thought you've had this week.

Meos keeps the one that matters. getmeos.com

#privacy #localfirst

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1 week ago

Nobody can look you up. Not us. Not anyone. Your identity is a cryptographic key on your phone, not an email in a database.

getmeos.com

#privacy #localfirst

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1 week ago

Looking to promote a gentle way to a work tracking app with cognitive ergonomics

github.com/Chadders13/S...

#OpenSource #BuildInPublic #Dyslexia #Neurodivergent #LocalFirst #Python #Productivity #AuDHD

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1 week ago

Your garden grew faster than you could tend it. Meos remembers the roots.

#privacy #localfirst

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1 week ago

You didn't build a second brain. You built a second job.

Meos doesn't ask you to tend anything. You write, it remembers, and six months later your own words find you back. getmeos.com

#privacy #localfirst

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1 week ago

Meos doesn't organise your thoughts. It recognises them.

#privacy #localfirst

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1 week ago

Most people don't know this yet. Your phone can run a full AI that knows your writing, your patterns, your context... without sending a single thought to anyone's cloud.

Meos built that. meos.do

#privacy #localfirst

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warpfork

@warpfork.bsky.social

1 week ago

Who's working on #localfirst code review tools?

Online git hubs aren't going away, but there's no reason for them to have a strangleholds on code review, nor drag it online.

Tools that diff two local branches. And help stage a markdown doc that serves as the review. Who's building?

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2 weeks ago

You don't forget ideas because you're careless. You forget them because your notes app treats every thought like a filing problem instead of a living thing.

Meos remembers by meaning, not location. getmeos.com

#privacy #localfirst

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