Rewrite README as internal deployment/reference documentation

Replace the original upstream template README (public-project framing,
roadmap items already built, links to a different GitHub repo) with
documentation matching the actual private deployment: real
docker-compose.yml, the Gitea->Dockhand rebuild-on-push behavior, env
vars/CLI flags, data file locations, and the full current feature set
(theming, notes hub, video duration/ffprobe caching, backup export,
Outline integration) that had never been documented.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
This commit is contained in:
2026-08-23 22:30:00 -04:00
co-authored by Claude Sonnet 5
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# OfflineU: Self-Hosted Local Course Loader & Progress Tracker # OfflineU
**OfflineU** is a sleek, self-hosted web app designed to load and view your offline video, audio, text, and quiz-based training courses. Whether it's Udemy downloads, "open sourced" training archives, or personal content, OfflineU turns your course folder into a fully navigable dashboard with automatic progress tracking. Self-hosted course viewer for a local video/audio/text training library. Runs
as a single Flask app in Docker, tracks watch progress and notes per lesson,
and gives the whole library a dashboard-style home page instead of a bare
file browser.
This is a personal deployment, not a public project — this doc is internal
reference for running/maintaining it, not a pitch.
![Lesson view](images/lesson-0-8-2025-08-04-04_58_17.png)
*Screenshot predates the current theming/icon work — kept for a rough idea
of layout, not pixel-accurate.*
--- ---
## ✨ Features ## Deployment
* 📁 **Dynamic folder parsing**: Scans and maps your course structure into a browsable tree view. Deployed via `docker-compose.yml`, built directly from the `Dockerfile` in
* 🎥 **Video & Audio player**: Integrated media player with resume & completion tracking. this repo (`pull_policy: build`, not a registry pull):
* 📄 **Text & HTML viewer**: Supports .txt, .md, .html, .pdf, and more.
***Lesson progress tracking**: Auto-saves your time spent and marks lessons as completed. ```yaml
* ♻️ **Continue where you left off**: Resume instantly from your last-accessed lesson. services:
* 💾 **Local-first & private**: 100% offline. No cloud, no tracking, no nonsense. offlineu:
* 🧑‍💻 **Works with any course format**: No metadata required, just structured folders. build: .
* 🧠 **Ideal for hoarders, students, or offline learning setups** pull_policy: build
container_name: offlineu
network_mode: host
ports:
- "5000:5000"
environment:
- PUID=1000
- PGID=10
- TZ=America/New_York
- FLASK_ENV=production
volumes:
- /volume1/files/training:/app/courses # course library
- /volume2/docker/offlineu/data:/app/data # settings/progress/notes
restart: unless-stopped
```
**Auto-deploy:** the Gitea repo has a webhook to Dockhand — a push to `main`
triggers a full image **rebuild** from the Dockerfile (confirmed, not just a
container restart), so Dockerfile changes (e.g. adding `ffmpeg`) take effect
on the very next push without any manual step.
--- ---
## 🗈️ Screenshots ## Local development
> ![image](https://github.com/WhiskeyCoder/OfflineU/blob/main/images/lesson-0-8-2025-08-04-04_58_17.png) ```bash
pip install -r requirements.txt
python offlineu_core.py --library-path /path/to/courses --debug
```
Opens on `http://127.0.0.1:5000`. `ffprobe` (from ffmpeg) needs to be on
`PATH` for video-duration lookups to work locally; without it those just
silently stay blank instead of erroring.
### CLI options
| Option | Description |
| ---------------------- | ----------------------------------------------------- |
| `--host` | Bind host (default `0.0.0.0`) |
| `--port` | Bind port (default `5000`) |
| `--debug` | Enable Flask debug mode |
| `--create-templates` | Regenerate default templates if missing |
| `--library-path` | Course library root (overrides `COURSES_LIBRARY_PATH`) |
| `course_path` (positional) | Load a specific course directly at startup |
### Environment variables
| Variable | Default | Purpose |
| ---------------------- | -------------- | ------------------------------------------ |
| `COURSES_LIBRARY_PATH` | `/app/courses` | Course library root |
| `OFFLINEU_DATA_DIR` | `/app/data` | Where settings/progress/notes data lives |
| `AUTO_LOAD_COURSE` | — | Course path to load automatically on start |
--- ---
## 🛠️ Installation ## Features
### 🔁 Quick Start (Local) **Library browsing**
- Lazy-loading folder browser (grid or list view) with search, including an
opt-in transcript search across subtitle files
- Course cards show media file count, total video/audio runtime, and
completion % at a glance
- Hide courses/folders from the browser without touching anything on disk;
bulk-select to hide or queue several at once
- Bulk rename across course/folder names (find & replace)
1. Clone the repo: **Dashboard**
- Library-wide stats (courses, lessons completed, time watched, day streak)
and a 90-day activity heatmap
- Next Up queue (manually curated, reorderable)
- Pick Back Up (courses with progress that have gone stale)
- Recently Added / Recently Viewed
- Surprise Me — random pick, weighted toward incomplete courses
```bash **Playback & progress**
git clone https://github.com/WhiskeyCoder/OfflineU.git - Video/audio player with resize, playback-speed presets, and resume-from-
cd OfflineU last-position
``` - Auto-tracks watch progress and completion per lesson
- Video/audio durations read via `ffprobe` and cached persistently per
course (`.offlineu_duration_cache.json`), so total runtime and per-lesson
length show up before you've ever pressed play — not just after
- Settings → "Precompute Video Lengths" walks the whole library in the
background to populate that cache up front, with live progress
2. Install Python dependencies: **Notes**
- Timestamped notes per lesson, capturable via a keyboard shortcut without
leaving the player
- Notes Hub: every note across the whole library, searchable, in one list
- Per-course study guide export (markdown, organized by section)
```bash **Personalization** (Settings)
pip install flask - Built-in themes or a custom accent color, corner radius, and card style
``` - Font, text size, page width, and spacing density
- Default library path override + manual "Refresh Library" (bypasses the
5-minute filesystem-scan cache)
3. Run the app: **Backup & integrations**
- One-click backup export: settings, hidden-path choices, recent-view
```bash history, and every course's progress/notes as a zip (not the course files
python offlineu_core.py --create-templates themselves)
``` - Optional [Outline](https://www.getoutline.com/) integration — push a
lesson's notes to an Outline document/collection
4. Open your browser:
```
http://127.0.0.1:5000
```
--- ---
## 📂 Folder Structure Example ## Data files
```bash Everything under `OFFLINEU_DATA_DIR` (app-wide, not tied to a course):
| File | Contents |
| ---------------------- | ------------------------------------------ |
| `settings.json` | Theme, layout, library path, etc. |
| `hidden_paths.json` | Courses/folders curated out of the browser |
| `next_up.json` | The Next Up queue, in order |
| `recent_views.json` | Cross-course "Recently Viewed" history |
| `outline_config.json` | Outline API token/collection mapping |
Per-course, written inside the course's own folder on the library volume:
| File | Contents |
| ----------------------------------- | ---------------------------------------------------- |
| `.offlineu_progress.json` | Per-lesson completed/progress/duration/notes |
| `.offlineu_duration_cache.json` | ffprobe duration cache, keyed by (path, size, mtime) |
---
## Folder structure example
```
MyCourse/ MyCourse/
├── Section 1/ ├── Section 1/
│ ├── 01 - Intro.mp4 │ ├── 01 - Intro.mp4
@@ -66,64 +161,19 @@ MyCourse/
│ ├── 04 - Advanced Tips.mp4 │ ├── 04 - Advanced Tips.mp4
│ └── resources/ │ └── resources/
│ └── extras.md │ └── extras.md
── .offlineu_progress.json ← created automatically ── .offlineu_progress.json ← created automatically
└── .offlineu_duration_cache.json ← created automatically
``` ```
> 🌟 File types are detected automatically — videos, audio, quizzes, and docs. No metadata files needed — course/section/lesson names come straight from
folder and file names.
--- ## Supported file types
## 📁 Supported File Types
| Type | Extensions | | Type | Extensions |
| --------- | ----------------------------------------------------------- | | --------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------ |
| Videos | `.mp4`, `.mkv`, `.webm`, `.mov`, `.avi`, etc. | | Video | `.mp4` `.mkv` `.avi` `.mov` `.webm` `.m4v` `.flv` `.wmv` |
| Audio | `.mp3`, `.wav`, `.aac`, etc. | | Audio | `.mp3` `.wav` `.m4a` `.aac` `.ogg` `.flac` |
| Docs | `.txt`, `.md`, `.html`, `.pdf`, `.docx` | | Documents | `.txt` `.md` `.html` `.htm` `.pdf` `.docx` `.doc` `.rtf` |
| Subtitles | `.srt`, `.vtt` | | Subtitles | `.srt` `.vtt` `.ass` `.sub` `.sbv` |
| Quizzes | Detected if file name contains `quiz`, `exam`, `test`, etc. | | Quizzes | Any doc file whose name contains `quiz`, `exam`, `test`, `assessment`, `exercise`, `assignment`, or `homework` |
---
## ⚙️ CLI Options
| Option | Description |
| -------------------- | ------------------------------- |
| `--host` | Set host (default: `127.0.0.1`) |
| `--port` | Set port (default: `5000`) |
| `--debug` | Enable Flask debug mode |
| `--create-templates` | Generate default HTML templates |
| `<course_path>` | Load course directly at startup |
---
## 🧠 Roadmap
* [x] Base function and testing
* [ ] Multi-user profile support
* [ ] Dark/light theme switcher
* [ ] Built-in quiz interactivity
* [ ] Import/export course metadata
* [ ] Mobile app wrapper
* [ ] Self hosted Docker Deployment
---
## 💬 Community
Join the development, suggest features, or ask questions via:
* GitHub Issues: [https://github.com/WhiskeyCoder/OfflineU/issues](https://github.com/WhiskeyCoder/OfflineU/issues)
---
## 🛡️ License
MIT License — Use freely, modify locally, share widely.
---
## ✨ Author
Built with ❤️ by [@WhiskeyCoder](https://github.com/WhiskeyCoder)
Inspired by the dream of **learning freely, offline, and without limits.**