- Just deployed RustChan on a Raspberry Pi 4. Single binary, no containers, no npm. Runs perfectly.
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>mfw it just works
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A self-hosted imageboard. One binary. Zero runtime dependencies.
- -RustChan ships with a complete imageboard stack. Drop it on a VPS, a Raspberry Pi, or your laptop — it runs immediately. All data lives in one directory next to the binary.
-image crate — GPS, device ID & all EXIF/XMP/IPTC metadata discardedCHAN_THUMB_SIZEshowwavespic filter ffmpegdb.rs for full control| Web framework | Axum 0.8 |
| Async runtime | Tokio 1.x |
| Database | SQLite / rusqlite (bundled) |
| Image processing | image crate |
| Password hashing | argon2 — Argon2id |
| HTML rendering | Plain Rust format! macros |
full-backups/ without stopping the serverVACUUM INTO — safe under live writesboard.json manifest (all posts, threads, polls, votes, file hash records)sqlite3_backup_init() API — no file swapping, no WAL corruption[a-zA-Z0-9._-] only — no path traversalsqlite3_backup_init() rather than file swapping[dice NdM] rolled at post time, embedded immutably in rendered HTMLshowwavespic filter — colour-matched to themerequire_ffmpeg = true to make absence a hard startup errorenable_tor_support = true in settings.tomlhostname filecross for ARM targetsX-Forwarded-For headerUser-selectable from a floating picker on every page. Persisted in localStorage with zero load flash. Click any theme below to preview it — this entire page will transform.
-RustChan handles images, video, and audio natively. When ffmpeg is present on PATH, it upgrades automatically — more formats, waveform thumbnails, and broad-compatibility transcoding. Without it, everything still works.
-image crate — all EXIF, GPS, XMP, IPTC discarded before savingCHAN_THUMB_SIZE, default 250px)require_ffmpeg = true to make absence a hard startup errorCHAN_MAX_AUDIO_MBshowwavespicYouTube, Invidious, and Streamable URLs pasted in post bodies are automatically detected and replaced with a click-to-play widget — identical in layout to a native WebM attachment.
-Every upload passes two independent security checks before being accepted. File extensions are never trusted — the actual binary content is inspected.
- -Every moderation action — bans, appeals, board config, content removal, backups, word filters, database maintenance — is available directly from the web admin panel. The CLI is there if you need it for scripting.
-New thread creation can be gated behind a SHA-256 hashcash PoW challenge solved silently in the browser. No images to click, no third-party tracking, no accessibility barriers.
-All admin operations are also available from the command line — ideal for provisioning scripts, automated backups, and CI pipelines.
- -No Postgres to configure, no Redis to run, no migrations to manage manually. SQLite is bundled at compile time — no system library required. WAL mode gives you concurrent reads without connection queuing.
-Everything lives in one directory next to the binary. Migrating to a new server is literally cp -r rustchan-data/ newserver:
Write-Ahead Logging lets multiple readers proceed simultaneously while a single writer commits — no read-blocking, no connection queuing under normal load. The WAL file is checkpointed by a configurable background task (default: every 3600s) to prevent it from growing unbounded.
-r2d2 + r2d2_sqlite manages a pool of open SQLite connections. Async Axum handlers check out a connection, execute SQL, return it immediately — no blocking the async executor.
-All queries are handwritten SQL in src/db.rs. No query builder, no migrations framework, no N+1 surprises. You can read every query the app will ever run in one file.
RustChan's backup system is entirely web-based — every action happens from the admin panel, no SSH required. Full site or per-board, save to server or download to your laptop, restore without restarting.
-A full backup is a single .zip containing a consistent SQLite snapshot (via VACUUM INTO, safe under live writes) plus every board's uploaded files and thumbnails.
rustchan-data/full-backups/ — listed in the panel for later download or restore..zip directly to your browser — no wget, no scp..zip from your computer directly to restore. Useful when moving instances or recovering from a cloud backup..zip from the server filesystem. Filename validated to [a-zA-Z0-9._-] before any filesystem operation.Board backups are fully self-contained. A board.json manifest carries every post, thread, poll, vote, and file hash record for that board — plus the entire upload directory. Other boards are never touched.
Security is built in, not bolted on. Every layer of the stack has been thought through — from passwords to file uploads to IP privacy.
-No containers. No npm install. No runtime to maintain. Build, create an admin account, create some boards, run.
-rustchan-data/settings.toml is generated automatically
- with a freshly-generated cookie_secret and every setting documented inline.
- Edit it and restart to apply changes. Everything lives in rustchan-data/ — migrations are a cp -r.
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