Developer builds open-source messenger Ack with code blocks, secret vaults and GitHub sign-in

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A developer is building Ack, an open-source chat app aimed at programmers, to address the difficulty of discussing code in ordinary messengers. Its features include code blocks and diffs styled like an editor, plus secret vaults that encrypt a sensitive value in the browser and delete it once the recipient reveals it. The current version supports GitHub sign-in, searching for and inviting users, one-on-one chats, and cross-device sync via Appwrite. Conversation locking and server-side secret deletion are still in progress, so the author advises against sharing real credentials, and voice, video and pair programming remain disabled behind feature flags. The project is built with Vite, React, TypeScript and Vercel, with the author relying on an AI coding IDE and describing themselves as a non-hand-coder.

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