Ketut Dana

Posted on Mar 14

Try XtermChat | Self Hosted Terminal Chat App

#terminal #python #chat #hosting

I got tired of my team's messages living on someone else's server.

Not because I'm paranoid. Just because I could do better. Slack logs everything. Discord has its own rules. Matrix is powerful but setting it up feels like a weekend project. Mattermost is great — if you have an afternoon and enjoy reading YAML.

So I built something simpler.

What is XtermChat?

XtermChat is a self-hosted chat system that runs entirely in the terminal. You deploy the server on your own VPS, your team connects with a CLI client, and that's it. No accounts, no dashboards, no third-party anything.

┌──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│                      X T E R M  C H A T                      │
│               For Those Who Speak Terminal.                  │
└──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

  ▸ COMMANDS
    connect          Connect client to a server
    disconnect       Remove saved server config
    status           Check server connection
    list:rooms       List all available rooms
    create:room      Create a new room
    delete:room      Delete a room permanently
    start:chat       Open interactive chat
    start:web        Open web interface

Why another chat tool?

Fair question. Here's my honest comparison:

	XtermChat	Matrix	Mattermost	Slack
Self-hosted	✅	✅	✅	❌
Open source	✅	✅	⚠️ partial	❌
Setup time	~5 min	~2 hrs	~30 min	instant
RAM usage	~30 MB	~1–2 GB	~300 MB	—
Terminal-first	✅	❌	❌	❌
Your data	✅	✅	✅	❌

The gap I wanted to fill: something that's self-hosted, lightweight, and actually fast to set up — especially for developers who live in the terminal anyway.

The setup is genuinely fast

Server side (your VPS)

git clone https://github.com/dnysaz/xtc-server.git
cd xtc-server
pip install flask flask-cors
sudo ufw allow 8080
python3 server.py start
# [*] Server started in background (PID: 12345)

That's it. No database configuration. No config files to edit. SQLite handles everything automatically on first run.

Client side (your machine)

git clone https://github.com/dnysaz/xtc-client.git
cd xtc-client
make install
xtc connect @your-server-ip:8080

Now you're connected. Create a room and start chatting:

xtc create:room @general
xtc start:chat @general

Total time from zero to chatting: under 10 minutes, including the time it takes to spin up a VPS.

The chat UI

When you run xtc start:chat, you get a full terminal UI — not just a scrolling log. There's a left sidebar showing your identity and connection info, a right sidebar with room details, and a chat area in the middle.

A few things I'm particularly happy with:

Tab to switch modes. Press Tab to move focus from the input box into the chat history. From there you can scroll, select text, and copy it — just like a normal text editor.

Links are clickable. URLs in messages show up with underline formatting. Move your cursor to a link and press Ctrl+L to open it in your browser.

Emoji shortcuts. Type :fire and it converts to 🔥 when you send. Type :e to see all available shortcuts in a floating panel.

  XtermChat-CLI  |  NODE: mac-dana  |  103.45.67.89  |  [ INPUT ]

  ┌─────────────┬──────────────────────────────────┬─────────────┐
  │ ID          │                                  │ CHANNEL     │
  │  KETUT      │  now  You   ❯  hey everyone!     │  #GENERAL   │
  │             │  2m   John  ❯  hello!            │             │
  │ GATEWAY     │  5m   You   ❯  https://github.com│ CREATOR     │
  │  103.45.7   │                                  │  KETUT      │
  └─────────────┴──────────────────────────────────┴─────────────┘
  ✏️  INPUT MODE  │  ENTER: SEND  │  TAB: → CHAT  │  Ctrl+X: EXIT
   Message ❯❯❯ _

How identity works

There's no signup. Your username comes from your system user (whoami), and your identity is tied to your machine's hardware UUID. First time you send a message, you're automatically registered on the server. If someone else tries to use the same username from a different machine, the server rejects it.

This means:

No passwords to remember for your identity
No accounts to create
Your identity is device-bound — which is actually the right behavior for a team tool

Room passwords are hashed with bcrypt. Only the room creator (verified by hardware PIN) can delete a room or wipe its message history.

Web interface included

Not everyone on a team lives in the terminal. So there's also a web UI:

xtc start:web
# URL: http://localhost:5000

Open it in a browser, enter your server IP, a username, and a 5-digit PIN — that's your identity for the web client. It talks to the same server API as the CLI, so everyone sees the same messages regardless of which client they're using.

The stack

Backend: Python + Flask, SQLite3
CLI: Python with prompt_toolkit
Web: Flask serving plain HTML + vanilla JS
Auth: Hardware UUID (CLI) or user-chosen PIN (web)
Protocol: REST API over HTTP or HTTPS

No Docker required. No Postgres. No Redis. No node_modules. The entire server runs on Python with two pip packages.

What's next

A few things I'm thinking about:

End-to-end encryption for messages
File sharing (small files, inline in chat)
Webhook support for notifications from CI/CD pipelines
Federation — connecting multiple servers so teams on different VPS instances can chat

But honestly the current version already does exactly what I need day to day. Sometimes simple is the right call.

Try it

Server: github.com/dnysaz/xtc-server
Client: github.com/dnysaz/xtc-client

This is the documentation : https://xtermchat.vercel.app/

If you're running a small team, managing a homelab, or just want your chat data to stay on your own infrastructure — give it a shot. The setup is fast enough that there's really no reason not to try.

And if you find something broken or have a feature idea, issues and pull requests are very welcome.

Built with Python. Runs on a $5 VPS. Your data stays yours.

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