CODEVOID

sst - Simple Signal TUI

github.com/c0dev0id/sst

A terminal client for Signal. For people who live in the shell and want to read, send, and script Signal messages without a desktop GUI.

 Alice Wagner
────────────────────────────────────────────
 Alice Wagner  09:14
   Hey, are you free tonight?

 You  09:31
   Sure, sounds good!  ✓✓
   [2x❤️, 1x👍]
────────────────────────────────────────────
  j/k navigate   r reply   e edit   d delete   : command   q back
  -- NORMAL --

Features

  • Vim-modal chat — Normal / Insert / Command modes, colon commands (:react, :quit).
  • Full message flow — reply, edit, delete-for-everyone, reactions, read receipts.
  • Contact browser — start a chat with anyone synced, not just existing threads.
  • Attachments — stage, upload, and download files.
  • Scriptable CLI — send, print, watch, and more with text or JSON output.
  • Local SQLite store — messages and session keys live on disk, no server round-trip to read.

Getting started

  1. Build and install: make install (puts the release binary in ~/.bin/sst).
  2. Link to your phone: sst link — scan the QR code from Signal → Settings → Linked Devices → Link New Device.
  3. Run sst to open the TUI.

Data lives in ~/.local/share/sst (store, session keys, sst.log). Set RUST_LOG=debug for verbose logging.

Keybindings

Chat list and contact browser:

Key Action
j k ↑ ↓ Navigate
l / Enter / → Open chat
n Contact browser (chat list only)
h / Esc / ← Back
Q Quit

Chat window (Normal mode):

Key Action
j k Select newer / older message
i Compose (Insert mode)
r / e Reply / edit selected message
dd Delete selected own message for everyone
: Command mode
h / q / ← Back to chat list

Insert mode: Enter sends, Alt+Enter inserts a newline, Tab completes an @mention, Esc discards. Command mode: :react <emoji> (raw emoji or gemoji shortcode like wave), :quit.

CLI

sst runs non-interactively for scripting. send, print, and print-last can run alongside the TUI; other subcommands hold an exclusive lock.

Command Description
sst link Re-link via QR code (wipes existing session)
sst chats List threads, most recent first
sst contacts List known contacts and groups
sst print <ID> Print full chat history
sst print-last [-n N] <ID> Print the last N messages
sst watch <ID> Stream new incoming messages
sst send <ID> [TEXT] [--attach PATH]… Send a message (text or stdin)

<ID> is a contact UUID or 64-char hex group master key (from sst contacts). Add --format=json for NDJSON output, or --db <PATH> to override the store location.