Chyrp Lite

Chyrp Lite is a lightweight, self‑hosted blogging engine written in PHP 8.1+ that emphasizes simplicity without sacrificing extensibility. At its core, it exposes a clean MVC‑like architecture where Feathers (content types) and Pages (static content) are first‑class citizens. The application is intentionally designed to run on shared hosting, requiring only a standard LAMP stack (MySQL 5.7+, SQLite 3+, or PostgreSQL 10+) and a handful of core PHP extensions. Its codebase is under 12 k lines, making it approachable for developers who wish to contribute or fork the project.

• Language: PHP 8.1+ (strict typing, arrow functions, union types).
• Templating: Twig 3.x, enabling developers to craft themes with isolated logic and reusable blocks.
• Database Abstraction: PDO, with optional support for MySQL, SQLite, and PostgreSQL; migrations are handled via a simple SQL script set.
• Routing & Controllers: A minimal custom router dispatches requests to controller classes, keeping the request cycle under 200 ms on average.
• Security: Built‑in CSRF tokens, input sanitization with filter_var, and a rights model that supports granular user roles.
• Caching: The optional Cacher module uses file‑based caching (or Redis via PDO if configured) to reduce database load on high‑traffic sites.

• Feathers API: Each Feather type (Text, Photo, Video, Audio, etc.) is represented by a PHP class exposing CRUD methods. Developers can register new Feathers by implementing the FeatherInterface and adding configuration to config/feathers.php.
• Hooks & Filters: The Inject module allows modules to register callbacks on specific events (beforeRender, afterSave) or filter content streams, enabling deep customization without modifying core files.
• REST‑like Endpoints: While the primary interface is server‑rendered, several modules expose lightweight JSON endpoints (e.g., /api/comments, /api/likes) that can be consumed by single‑page applications or external services.
• Webhooks: The Mentionable module listens for incoming Webmentions and stores them, making it trivial to integrate with external blog networks.

Chyrp Lite is intentionally lightweight: a single PHP file per module, no background workers required. It runs on any LAMP/LEMP stack with PHP‑CLI for migrations, making it a natural fit for Docker containers or serverless functions that support PHP. A typical Dockerfile would copy the source, install Composer dependencies, and expose port 80. For scaling, developers can deploy multiple instances behind a load balancer; the caching layer and database replication are fully supported.

• Plugin System: Modules live in modules/, each with its own manifest. Adding a new module is as simple as dropping a folder and updating the config/modules.php array.
• Theme Development: Twig templates (templates/) are fully overridable; developers can create child themes that inherit base layouts.
• Third‑Party Integration: The architecture allows integration with external services (e.g., OAuth providers, payment gateways) by writing small adapters that hook into the user model or content workflow.

The documentation is concise yet thorough, with multilingual support (English, German, Italian, Korean, Dutch, Simplified Chinese). The project follows semantic versioning and publishes release notes on GitHub. Community support is active; contributors are encouraged via pull requests, and the issue tracker is used for feature discussions. Configuration files are simple PHP arrays, enabling straightforward environment overrides without templating.

1. Personal or Indie Blog – A developer wants a self‑hosted blog with responsive design and minimal maintenance.
2. Documentation Hub – Using Feathers and Pages, teams can publish tutorials, changelogs, and API docs in a single platform.
3. Micro‑CMS for Projects – Small businesses can expose product updates and media galleries without a full CMS stack.
4. Educational Projects – Students learning PHP can study the codebase, extend it with new Feathers, and deploy via Docker.

• Performance: Lightweight core + optional caching keeps response times low, even on shared hosting.
• Flexibility: The Feather system lets developers define arbitrary content types; the hook/filters API allows deep customization.
• Licensing: Open‑source under MIT, giving developers freedom to modify and redistribute.
• Ease of Deployment: No complex build steps; a simple file upload is enough to run the application.
• Accessibility & Standards: Built with semantic HTML5 and ARIA labels, ensuring compliance for users relying on assistive technologies.

In summary, Chyrp Lite offers a developer‑friendly, standards‑compliant blogging platform that can evolve from a simple personal blog to a full‑featured micro‑CMS, all while remaining easy to host and extend.