OrangeCat
Your AI economic agent — and the platform where it operates.
The Problem
Economic participation still requires gatekeepers. To sell, fund, lend, invest, or govern collectively, you need banks, payment processors, platforms that take cuts and dictate terms. Pseudonymous participation is impossible. AI agents can't transact on your behalf.
The Solution
OrangeCat is an AI-native platform for universal economic participation. The wedge today is a Bitcoin Lightning pay link. "My Cat" — an AI agent across exchanging, funding, lending, investing, and governing — is roadmap, not what ships today.
- Any identity: Human, pseudonymous, or AI — all are first-class economic participants
- Bitcoin now, broader rails later: Lightning and on-chain Bitcoin are the only live settlement rails. Fiat and privacy rails remain roadmap work because they do not provide the same shared public audit trail.
- Full economic spectrum (roadmap beyond the pay link): From gifts (no strings) to loans (some strings) to investments (more strings)
- Private where needed, transparent where chosen: on-chain transparency when appropriate; E2E-encrypted messaging is roadmap — direct messages are stored as plaintext today (realtime, but server-readable)
What Works Today
- Pay link (the wedge): every user gets
orangecat.ch/pay/<username> for Bitcoin Lightning payments.
- Site (beta): orangecat.ch
- Shipped surfaces: product/service listings, groups, events, documents, and related entity types exist on the site. Funding, lending, and investing sit on the roadmap.
- Loki dogfood: Loki, the execution layer (deployed at loki.orangecat.ch), uses OrangeCat as a sibling product — typed stakeholder edges, shared BTC wallet, profiles as projects.
Roadmap
- Funding: account-free Bitcoin support for public projects
- Lending: peer-to-peer loans with repayment tracking
- Investing: investment flows beyond the pay-link wedge
- The Cat: AI agent that manages economic activity across the full spectrum
Architecture
15 entity types, one registry. One ownership model (actors), one permission layer (database RLS). Adding a new entity type requires 2-3 files.
Entity Registry Pattern
src/config/entity-registry.ts — single source of truth for all 15 entity types. Drives CRUD, navigation, forms, and validation. No entity-specific switch statements.
Actor System
Users and groups both have actors. All entities reference actor_id. One ownership model, one permission check — works for individuals, organizations, and (future) AI agents.
Middleware Composition
export const POST = compose(withRequestId(), withRateLimit('write'), withZodBody(schema))(handler);
Functional composition replaces inheritance. Each middleware does one thing.
Security
- Row Level Security (RLS) at the database level — bugs in app code can't bypass authorization
- Zod schemas as SSOT — TypeScript types derived from schemas, never separate
- Structured API responses (
src/lib/api/standardResponse.ts) across the API routes
Tech Stack
| Layer | Technology |
|---|
| Framework | Next.js 16, React 19, TypeScript 6 |
| Styling | Tailwind CSS 4, shadcn/ui |
| Database | Self-hosted Supabase (PostgreSQL + Auth + RLS) on Hetzner |
| Bitcoin | Lightning Network, LNURL, bitcoinjs-lib |
| Auth | Supabase Auth, JWT, Row Level Security |
| Deployment | Self-hosted on Hetzner (bitbaum, behind Caddy); GitHub Actions CI, then cd.yml deploys |
Prerequisites
- Node.js 24 (see
.nvmrc)
- A Supabase project (remote — no local Docker needed)
Setup
git clone https://github.com/bitbaum/orangecat.git
cd orangecat
pnpm install
cp .env.example .env.local
# Fill in Supabase credentials
pnpm run dev
Dev server starts at http://localhost:3000.
Environment Variables
See .env.example for the full list. Key variables:
NEXT_PUBLIC_SUPABASE_URL — Supabase project URLNEXT_PUBLIC_SUPABASE_ANON_KEY — Supabase anonymous keySUPABASE_SERVICE_ROLE_KEY — Server-side Supabase key
Run your own copy
OrangeCat is MIT. Everything a copy needs is in this repository; nothing points
at bitbaum's infrastructure that an environment variable cannot repoint.
This is the beginning of the README. Read the rest at the original. Read the full README ↗
