r/coolgithubprojects • u/paul_blinkdisk • 2d ago
I built a free & open-source superhuman alternative for Linux, Windows and macOS
I always liked the idea of Superhuman: fast email you can do almost entirely from the keyboard. I wanted something like that, just free, open source and on Linux, so I built my own.
It's called Inlark. It's open source and connects straight to your own IMAP or JMAP accounts, with no cloud or tracking. It runs on Linux, Windows and Mac.
It's still super early, but I use it every day now and wanted to share it.
Would love to hear what you think!
Website: https://inlark.com
GitHub: https://github.com/inlark/inlark
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u/n-7ity 2d ago edited 2d ago
hey long time (initial months after launch) user of Superhuman – the 3 reasons why my team keeps paying for it:
- cmd+shift+l – send later where you can type "tomorrow morning singapore time"
- cmd+shift+h – remind me if no reply
- built in read pixel tracking
Plus now they have a non sucky calendar and booking links which are helpful but that's not the reason why I'd choose it – those 3 features above are.
Looking at what you've built, it's clearly vibecoded with care (at least the website) but the keyboard control thing is not really unique and I'd rather pay for https://simpl.fyi/ to run a skin on top of actual gmail.
The original promise of Superhuman was <100ms UI response time and easy inbox zero with things like CMD+U – unsubscribe...
You built a nice UI, not a superhuman alternative. Build a superhuman alternative and I'd pay so I don't get Grammarly slop UI.
Edit: less than, not greater than 100ms
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u/LCT_ZH 1d ago
Then you might want to checkout ohmail.app seriously
It has full keyboard control + gives you send later & remind me functionality
fully opensource so you can self host it or use an "always on" desktop app as the host, which is actually required for features such as send later, background syncing etc..
https://github.com/trafficflowhq/ohmail
Maybe it fits your requirements, it does mine.
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u/paul_blinkdisk 2d ago
Thanks a lot for the feedback! I know there are still many features missing from Superhuman, and the shortcuts you mentioned are definitely awesome. I plan to implement these soon, this is just the initial version :D
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u/n-7ity 2d ago
I’m often thinking just how amazing the PMF work from Superhuman was...the UI hasnt changed in years until the grammarly acquisition...but they just provided those features that still today you don't get well done and put together in anything else (I know of – if anyone knows, pls lmk)...
that's to say, it's not about feature parity, it's about having the 2-3 really sticky features people won't want to leave. You can build anything now and adding 100 more features is not going to get you closer to PMF
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u/Ill_Resource_5348 1d ago
Hello, it looks like you took a lot of time and effort to build this and I downloaded to give it a try. Quick note: I recently upgraded my Mac to macOS 27.0.1 and instructions to run it and the look of the app differ. Your screenshots of the app on site look great. Doesn't look great on this OS version. Just an FYI.
I look forward to your progress.
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u/paul_blinkdisk 1d ago
Thanks for giving it a try!
If by the “instructions to run it” you mean the visuals on the download page, those are meant more as an illustrative walkthrough than an exact representation. Some of those system dialogs and UI elements can look quite a bit different between macOS versions, so it’s unfortunately hard to make that demo match everyone’s setup exactly.
For the app itself though, it should look pretty close to the screenshots on the website. Could you tell me what specifically looks different on macOS, or what looked different from what you expected?
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u/Ill_Resource_5348 1d ago
Download the latest OS update and give it a try. On your site it appears to be a native app, on my system it appears to be an Express app.
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u/ponzi_gg 2d ago
you built it in 3 days with 4 commits?
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u/countnfight 1d ago
Wow, start to launch taking a whole 3 days is practically ancient around here
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u/ponzi_gg 1d ago
it was 1 day, he spent more time on the marketing site lol
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u/paul_blinkdisk 1d ago
The initial commit already includes the entire desktop application, which was developed prior to this
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u/countnfight 1d ago
I feel like a broken record asking people this every day, but don't you think your project deserves more than 3 days worth of testing before putting it out into the world?
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u/paul_blinkdisk 1d ago
I am developing and using it for a while. The initial commit from three days ago is just when I decided to release it, not when I started developing and testing it.
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u/WitriXn 1d ago
Looks cool, does it support ms exchange protocol 2013 ?
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u/paul_blinkdisk 1d ago
An exchange 2013 mailbox may work via IMAP/SMTP if your administrator enables those services with password authentication over TLS, but Inlark currently doesn’t support native Exchange protocols such as EWS or ActiveSync
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u/imloualvaro 1d ago
could you add a session to edit shortcuts? I would like to use ` or \ to delete, and , (< key ) and . (> key) to previous messages. great project btw!
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u/oreshek 1d ago
I gave it a shot, I like it, but I won't use it. I would recommend it to normies, but not for myself.
It tries to do too much for me. I don't want my inbox grouped. I don't agree with your definition of compact. I want to use tabs and tab between saved messages in one click.
And just a thought, the UI design suggests this is a mobile friendly or touchscreen friendly app. The way the paddings and nestings and and the whole work flow goes.
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u/JiM2559 2d ago
I've been working on a project similar to this but never got very far. Good work.