PublicTxt PublicTxt

PublicTxt overview

wiki bookmarks · updated publictxt project docs
↗ github.com/publictxt/publictext

PublicTxt is an experiment in using Git repositories as an interoperability layer and online storage for public and community knowledge. By using free Git hosting and plain-text Markdown, individuals and communities can share, curate and collaborate on content without a centralised platform or paid infrastructure.

Desktop and web tools sync between local working copies and one or more Git repositories, selectively aggregate content from other people’s repositories, and publish to the web with static site generation — all on plain Markdown that outlives the tooling.

What it is, for now

The differentiator is selective aggregation across many Git-hosted repositories: subscribing to other people’s PublicTxt repositories and pulling chosen subsets (by tag, path or filter) into a local aggregate view. Markdown in Git, published as a static site, is the substrate; aggregation is the value.

v1 success looks like:

I can keep my notes and writing in a Git repository, publish them to the web for free via GitHub Pages or similar, and pull selected pages from other people’s PublicTxt repos into a local aggregate view I can browse and search.

Community features, browser extensions, federation and graph-database backends may come later. They aren’t v1. See the roadmap.

Core ideas

  • Plain text first — Markdown with standard [text](page.md) links, readable by any static-site host with no conversion. Tags are front matter tags: or inline #hashtags.
  • Zero-cost storage and hosting — free Git hosting for storage, distribution and static sites.
  • Static website generation — PublicTxt-Pages: push and you’re live, with full-text search and facets. See Publishing.
  • Selective aggregation — pull chosen content from other repositories into a local aggregate (not built yet).
  • Obsidian compatible — a PublicTxt repository is an Obsidian vault. Obsidian PublicTxt Facets brings the site’s browsing into the editor.

Use cases

  • Personal knowledge management, with version control and free hosting
  • Distributed blogging others can subscribe to and aggregate
  • Research and learning: pull peers’ content into a local view
  • Lightweight community wikis, using Git’s own collaboration (pull requests, branches, forks)

Licence and contributing

GPLv3 — see LICENSE. Contributing: CONTRIBUTING.md.