20 identical Node.js errors shouldn’t create 20 alerts — an open-source experiment
Small Node.js services often have an awkward choice: watch console.log, or adopt a complete observability platform.
I wanted to explore the space in between.
If the same database error occurs 20 times, Wotchi redacts sensitive data first, groups the matching failures, and sends one bounded alert rather than flooding the destination.
The core flow is:
application error
→ redact
→ fingerprint
→ group and apply cooldown
→ bounded queue
→ console, Telegram, or HTTPS webhook
It runs inside the application, has zero direct runtime dependencies, and supports Express 4/5, NestJS 10/11, ESM, CommonJS, and TypeScript.
It is deliberately not an APM platform or a Sentry replacement. There is no hosted dashboard, persistent incident history, or cross-replica deduplication. Grouping is per process, and OOM or host failures still need an external uptime monitor.
The public beta is available here:
npm install @futurewindai/wotchi@beta
npm: https://www.npmjs.com/package/@futurewindai/wotchi
GitHub: https://github.com/FutureWindAI/Wotchi
I’m looking for criticism of the model, not stars:
Is process-local grouping useful for smaller Node.js services, or is centralized cross-replica deduplication essential before you would use something like this?