Yonkly – Open Source Twitter
[update: Yonkly source code is now public]
[update 2: I just created www.isweat.com using the yonkly engine]
[update 3: Tons of new features]
Asp.net MVC framework rocks. I wanted to play with it more and decided why not build an open source twitter. Unfortunately, I couldn’t come up with a better name for it that had an available domain so Yonkly it is. Come to think of it Yonkly is not too bad – http://yonkly.com
I will post the source code online very soon at either codeplex or Google – not sure which one is better yet. Any suggestions? I just need to clean it up and add some comments before I post it online. Hopefully, no one will laugh at my code.
This first release has the following features (Note: this is only one week’s worth of work):
- Conversation threads – here is an example

- Message replies automatically turn into a conversation, just hit the reply button

- Message deletes – cannot delete messages that have been replied to.
- Follow and Un-follow friends
- Built-in URL shortening
- Public timeline
- Friends and followers stats
- Integration with Gravatar (www.gravatar.com)
- Search for friends by email or username
- Invite friends
Depending on community support and involvement, I am hopping to add the following features in the next release(s):
- REST API
- RSS feeds
- Twitter and Facebook integration
- Expanded user profile
- Friend finder – using gmail, hotmail, outlook imports, etc…
- Email notifications with opt-in/opt-out options
- Silverlight, Windows, mac and mobile clients (require the API)
- Migrate to SQL Server standard
- UI changes and improvements
The following was used to build the site:
- Asp.net 3.5 MVC Framework Preview 2
- JQuery for JavaScript and Ajax
- SQL Server Express
This was an excellent learning experience which was only possible because of all the MVC fans, bloggers and community. These are all my mvc-related bookmarks that I kept referring to during the development process – http://del.icio.us/eibrahim/mvc
FUN STUFF
How about becoming part of this open source project? If you are interested, leave a comment below or contact me via the contact page. Also, subscribe to my blog to get notified of updates, new releases and so on.
You can also find me on yonkly at yonkly.com/eibrahim or twitter (how ironic) at twitter.com/eibrahim
Tags: ASP.NET, ASP.NET MVC, mvc, projects, Yonkly






Fri, Apr 11, 2008
ASP.NET, ASP.NET MVC, Yonkly