The latest articles on Forem by ghost admin (@chatdevsixty). https://forem.com/chatdevsixty https://media2.dev.to/dynamic/image/width=90,height=90,fit=cover,gravity=auto,format=auto/https:%2F%2Fdev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fuploads%2Fuser%2Fprofile_image%2F3648182%2F75858634-b5c7-4a09-8f62-1e3e20cf19ac.png https://forem.com/chatdevsixty en ghost admin Fri, 05 Dec 2025 15:19:32 +0000 https://forem.com/chatdevsixty/how-i-built-a-ram-only-chat-app-that-logs-absolutely-nothing-nodejs-redis-1ghb https://forem.com/chatdevsixty/how-i-built-a-ram-only-chat-app-that-logs-absolutely-nothing-nodejs-redis-1ghb <p>I wanted to solve the "metadata problem." Most chat apps, even secure ones, keep logs of who talked to whom. I wanted to build a system where the data literally cannot exist once the session ends.</p> <p>The Architecture:</p> <p>Backend: A blind WebSocket relay (Node.js) running in volatile memory.</p> <p>Database: Redis configured as volatile-lru. Keys are evicted instantly. nothing is written to disk.</p> <p>Digital Silence: I configured Nginx to pipe access.log and error.log directly to /dev/null at the OS level.</p> <p>Client-Side: The frontend uses the HTML5 Canvas API to "scrub" images (destroying EXIF/GPS data) before encryption.</p> <p>It is free to use and donation-supported.</p> <p>Live Demo: <a href="https://backalleychat.com" rel="noopener noreferrer">https://backalleychat.com</a></p> javascript privacy security showdev