---
title: "Apron"
section: experiments
description: "Putting on an Apron."
tags: ["apron-chat", "rust", "swiftui", "ios"]
published: 2026-10-30T16:12:05Z
updated: 2026-10-30T16:12:50Z
cid: bafkreideksbcdalyacgilrkczsulbg2g5qcqsd6eawlr32j4u5zhwxfygi
html: https://iammatthias.com/experiments/1793375787000-apron
---

# Apron

My friend [Steve](https://stevedylan.dev/) told me about [Apron](https://apron.chat) earlier this week. It's an open chat protocol that launched recently, with small community of people from the early Farcaster days. With how things changed there recently with the new ownership, plenty of folks are looking for a new home on the web. Apron isn't a direct response to that, but you can feel the same ethos in it.

The protocol itself is well designed, which makes it easy to build on. So I did.

First I ported the Go reference server, [apron-server-go](https://github.com/apron-chat/apron-server-go), to Rust. Then I kept going until it matched the newer [Cloudflare server](https://github.com/apron-chat/apron-server-cloudflare): limits, passkeys, device tokens, link previews and the rest. The code is at [iammatthias/apron-server-rust](https://github.com/iammatthias/apron-server-rust).

I also built Ladle, a native iOS client in SwiftUI. You sign in with a device token (scan its QR code or paste it), by email, or as a guest, and you can add more than one server. The code is at [iammatthias/ladle](https://github.com/iammatthias/ladle), and you can try it on [TestFlight](https://testflight.apple.com/join/MK4PnY2N).

If you're curious, come say hi.

---

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