🕊️ Oldie-Goldie

A Being Human Cult (BHC) Initiative

A self-hostable, peer-to-peer encrypted chat system
with ephemeral tunnels, reusable invite tokens, and zero logs.

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📘 Table of Contents

• ✨ Core Features
• ⚡ TL;DR (Quick Start)
• 🌐 What is Oldie-Goldie?
• 💡 Why I Built It
• 🧭 Intended Usage
• 🧱 Guard Rails and Trust Model
• ☁️ Cloudflared Handling (Automatic)
• ⚙️ Installation
• 🐍 Python Compatibility
• 🚀 Usage
• 📚 Documentation
• 🧾 Changelog
• 🧪 Future Roadmap
• 🌿 About Being Human Cult (BHC)
• ☕ Support the Project
• 🤝 Contributing
• 📜 License
• 💬 Connect
• 🧡 A Note from the Author
• ❤️ Author

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✨ Core Features

• 🔐 Encrypted peer-to-peer tunnels
• 🪪 Token-based access control (single-use, bound, or reusable)
• 🔁 Token reuse support (--reuse)
• 🌐 Automatic Cloudflared tunneling (no installation required)
• 🧳 Zero logs — nothing stored, nothing retained
• 👥 Ephemeral one-to-one private sessions
• 🧩 Cross-platform (Linux · macOS · Windows)
• 🪶 Lightweight Python CLI
• 🕵️ Privacy-first, open-source, auditable

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⚡ TL;DR (Quick Start)

Start a public server (auto-tunnel + tokens):

og-server --host public --invite-token --token-count 1 --reuse

Client connects:

og-client --server-host public --url <server-url> --token <token>

Initiate a private encrypted tunnel:

/connect @peer

Enter your PSK → Tunnel established.

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🌐 What is Oldie-Goldie?

Oldie-Goldie is an on-demand, peer-to-peer encrypted, self-hostable chat system for people who want privacy without relying on centralized services.

You spin up a temporary server → share a URL + token → chat → destroy everything.
Nothing persists. Nothing leaks.

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💡 Why I Built It

🕵️ The Problem

Modern messaging services promise privacy — but often log metadata, store your messages, or use your data for ad targeting and behavioral profiling. Even when encryption is claimed, the closed-source nature of these apps makes it impossible to know if your messages are truly private.

“Mining for gold without opening the chest.” That’s how metadata surveillance works — who you message, when, how often — all reveal more than you think.

I wanted a fallback — a chat app that was:

• Open source and auditable
• Truly self-hostable
• Peer-to-peer encrypted, with no middleman

So I built Oldie-Goldie, and it became my trusted space for private discussions.

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🧠 The Solution

Oldie-Goldie gives you:

• Direct, secure, ephemeral connections
• No cloud storage
• No accounts
• End-to-end encrypted tunnels
• Invite-token based access control

You spin up a temporary server, share a link + token with your peer, chat securely, and shut it all down when done. Nothing is logged, nothing persists — just you and your peer.

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🧭 Intended Usage

Pre-requisite: Out-of-Band Sharing

1. Usernames (pseudonyms) — agree beforehand with your peer.
2. PSK (pre-shared key) — share a private key to authenticate tunnels.

Flow for Global Server

Update (v0.6.0): Oldie-Goldie now automatically downloads and manages Cloudflared using pycloudflared.
No installation. No PATH setup. Nothing manual.

1. Start the server (--host public)
2. Share the generated public URL
3. Register pseudonyms
4. /list_users to find your peer
5. /connect @username
6. Enter the shared PSK
7. The server relays traffic blindly over the encrypted tunnel

⚠️ Disclaimer Oldie-Goldie is not a social media or group chat platform. It’s designed for private, ephemeral one-to-one communication, where simplicity and trust are prioritized.

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🧱 Guard Rails and Trust Model

Layer	Purpose
Pre-shared pseudonyms	Protects identity
Pre-shared secret/password	Proof of identity
Token-based access	Prevents unauthorized entry
Temporary tunnels	Ensure no data persistence

🔐 Example: Token-Based Secure Server

Generate bound tokens:

og-server --host public --invite-token --bind alice bob

Generate reusable tokens (v0.6.0):

og-server --host public --invite-token --bind alice bob --reuse

Then connect:

og-client --server-host public --url <server-url> --token <token>

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☁️ Cloudflared Handling (Automatic)

Oldie-Goldie (v0.6.0) introduces automatic integration via pycloudflared.

✔ No manual installation needed

✔ No PATH configuration

✔ Works on Windows, Linux, macOS, and virtual environments

✔ Cloudflared binary is downloaded automatically and sandboxed

This significantly simplifies public tunneling:

og-server --host public

Done. Tunneling works out of the box.

Manual installation instructions are now unnecessary and removed.

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⚙️ Installation

Oldie-Goldie supports Python 3.10–3.13 on Linux, macOS, and Windows.

Note: Python 3.14 is currently not supported due to missing upstream wheels (cffi, cryptography, etc.). See “Python Compatibility” below.

📌 Standard Install

pip install oldie-goldie

🧰 If pip is not recognized

python -m pip install oldie-goldie

# or

python3 -m pip install oldie-goldie

✨ (Optional) Add pip to PATH

OS	How
Windows	Add %LocalAppData%\Programs\Python\PythonXY\Scripts\ to PATH
Linux/macOS	Add ~/.local/bin to PATH

⬆️ Upgrade

pip install --upgrade oldie-goldie

🛠 Install from Source (for developers)

git clone https://github.com/venukotamraju/Oldie-Goldie.git
cd Oldie-Goldie
python -m pip install -r requirements.txt
pip install -e .

🧿 Troubleshooting

Issue	Fix
pip: comman not found	Use python -m pip or add pip to PATH
AttributeError: drain / asyncio mismatch	Upgrade Python to 3.10+ and reinstall
ModuleNotFoundError after install	Ensure you're using the same interpreter that installed the package

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🐍 Python Compatibility

Supported Versions

✔ Python 3.10
✔ Python 3.11
✔ Python 3.12
✔ Python 3.13

Not Yet Supported

❌ Python 3.14
→ Missing upstream wheels (cryptography, cffi)
→ Support will be added automatically once dependencies publish them

Workarounds (pyenv, conda, etc.) included in documentation.

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🚀 Usage

🖥️ Run Server

Local

og-server --host local

Public (with Automatic Tunnel)

og-server --host public

Protected (Invite Tokens)

og-server --host public --invite-token --token-count 2

Strongly Protected (Bound Tokens)

og-server --host public --invite-token --bind alice bob

Reusable Tokens (New in v0.6.0)

og-server --host public --invite-token --bind alice bob --reuse

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💬 Run Client

Connect Locally

og-client --server-host local

Connect Remotely

og-client --server-host public --url <server-url>

Connect with Token

og-client --server-host public --url <server-url> --token <token>

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📚 Documentation

Full usage guide · CLI examples · Architecture · Python compatibility · Changelog
🔗 https://venukotamraju.github.io/Oldie-Goldie

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🧾 Changelog

See CHANGELOG.md for the full version history and upcoming features.

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🧪 Future Roadmap

• Extend safe_input with foreground/background input support
• Enable server-side dynamic token generation
• Tidy client logs
• Add Android support
• Architectural docs expansion

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🌿 About Being Human Cult (BHC)

The Tech wing of Being Human Cult (BHC) is a community-driven initiative focused on building humane, open-source technologies that empower people to connect authentically and privately — without exploitation, surveillance, or data harvesting.

Oldie-Goldie is developed and maintained under the BHC umbrella as a free and open-source project.
Learn more: https://beinghumancult.blogspot.com

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☕ Support the Project

Oldie-Goldie is free, open-source, and maintained with care by volunteers. If you’d like to support development or buy the maintainers a coffee:

• 💖 Buy Me a Coffee: (link coming soon)
• 💰 GitHub Sponsors: (link coming soon)
• 🪙 Ko-fi: (link coming soon)
• 📢 Share the project! — word of mouth helps more than you think.

Your support keeps the project independent and privacy-focused. 🙏

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🤝 Contributing

Pull requests are welcome! If you’d like to contribute, please:

1. Fork the repo
2. Create a new branch
3. Make your changes
4. Submit a PR

Or open an issue to discuss ideas.

For more detailed developer setup and contributing guidelines, see CONTRIBUTING.md

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📜 License

Licensed under the APACHE 2.0.
Copyright © 2025
Venu Kotamraju, under the Being Human Cult (BHC) initative.

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💬 Connect

• GitHub → Oldie-Goldie
• PyPI → oldie-goldie
• LinkedIn → [Link coming soon...]
• Blog → Being Human Cult

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🧡 A Note from the Author

I built Oldie-Goldie to reclaim digital privacy. It’s not about hiding — it’s about owning your data and choosing who gets to see it.

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❤️ Author

Venu Kotamraju
kotamraju.venugopal@gmail.com
GitHub

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