nitter/README.md

# Nitter (WIP)

[![Build Status](https://travis-ci.org/zedeus/nitter.svg?branch=master)](https://travis-ci.org/zedeus/nitter)

A free and open source alternative Twitter front-end focused on privacy. \
Inspired by the [invidio.us](https://github.com/omarroth/invidious) project.

- No JavaScript or ads
- All requests go through the backend, client never talks to Twitter
- Prevents Twitter from tracking your IP or JavaScript fingerprint
- Unofficial API (no rate limits or developer account required)
- Lightweight (for [@nim_lang](https://nitter.net/nim_lang), 58KB vs 784KB from twitter.com)
- RSS feeds
- Themes
- Mobile support (responsive design)
- AGPLv3 licensed, no proprietary instances permitted

## Todo (roughly in this order)

- Embeds
- Archiving tweets/profiles
- Simple account system with customizable feed
- Json API endpoints
- Emoji support (WIP, uses native font for now)

## Resources

The wiki contains a list of
[Nitter instances](https://github.com/zedeus/nitter/wiki/Instances) and
a list of [browser extensions](https://github.com/zedeus/nitter/wiki/Extensions)
maintained by the community.

## Why?

It's basically impossible to use Twitter without JavaScript enabled. If you try,
you're redirected to the legacy mobile version which is awful both functionally
and aesthetically. For privacy-minded folks, preventing JavaScript analytics and
potential IP-based tracking is important, but apart from using the legacy mobile
version and a VPN, it's impossible. This is is especially relevant now that Twitter
[removed the ability](https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/04/twitter-removes-privacy-option-and-shows-why-we-need-strong-privacy-laws) 
for users to control whether their data gets sent to advertisers.

Using an instance of Nitter (hosted on a VPS for example), you can browse
Twitter without JavaScript while retaining your privacy. In addition to
respecting your privacy, Nitter is on average around 15 times lighter than
Twitter, and in most cases serves pages faster (eg. timelines 2-4x faster).

In the future a simple account system will be added that lets you follow Twitter
users, allowing you to have a clean chronological timeline without needing a
Twitter account.

## Screenshot

![nitter](/screenshot.png)

## Installation

To compile Nitter you need a Nim installation, see
[nim-lang.org](https://nim-lang.org/install.html) for details. It is possible to
install it system-wide or in the user directory you create below.

To compile the scss files, you need to install `libsass`. On Ubuntu and Debian,
you can use `libsass-dev`.

Redis is required for caching and in the future for account info. It should be
available on most distros as `redis` or `redis-server` (Ubuntu/Debian).
Running it with the default config is fine, Nitter's default config is set to
use the default Redis port and localhost.

Here's how to create a `nitter` user, clone the repo, and build the project
along with the scss.

```bash
# useradd -m nitter
# su nitter
$ git clone https://github.com/zedeus/nitter
$ cd nitter
$ nimble build -d:release
$ nimble scss
$ mkdir ./tmp
```

Set your hostname, port, HMAC key, https (must be correct for cookies), and
Redis info in `nitter.conf`, run `redis-server --daemonize yes`, then run Nitter
by executing `./nitter`. You should run Nitter behind a reverse proxy such as
[Nginx](https://github.com/zedeus/nitter/wiki/Nginx) or Apache for security
reasons.

To build and run Nitter in Docker:
```bash
docker build -t nitter:latest .
docker run -v $(pwd)/nitter.conf:/src/nitter.conf -d -p 8080:8080 nitter:latest
```

A prebuilt Docker image is provided as well:
```bash
docker run -v $(pwd)/nitter.conf:/src/nitter.conf -d -p 8080:8080 zedeus/nitter:latest
```

Note the Docker commands expect a `nitter.conf` file in the directory you run them.

To run Nitter via systemd you can use this service file:

```bash
[Unit]
Description=Nitter (An alternative Twitter front-end)
After=syslog.target
After=network.target

[Service]
Type=simple

# set user and group
User=nitter
Group=nitter

# configure location
WorkingDirectory=/home/nitter/nitter
ExecStart=/home/nitter/nitter/nitter

Restart=always
RestartSec=15

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target
```

Then enable and run the service:
`systemctl enable --now nitter.service`

## Donating <a href="https://liberapay.com/zedeus/donate"><img alt="Donate using Liberapay" src="https://liberapay.com/assets/widgets/donate.svg"></a>

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## Contact

Feel free to join our Freenode IRC channel at #nitter, or our
[Matrix server](https://riot.im/app/#/room/#nitter:matrix.org).
You can email me at zedeus@pm.me if you wish to contact me personally.