Alpha

A $5/mo personal newsletter. Users pick 5 topics from a curated menu of 25 (add-on bundles up to 25 topics, $25/mo); every day (14:00 UTC) we deliver an AI-written letter built from real sources — every cited link must come from that send's live search, enforced in code (lib/engine/url-guard.ts). Each send only looks at what's new since the last one (lib/cadence.ts).

Lives at alpha.everyday.report (its own domain, app at the root — no basePath). everyday.report redirects there. The old home, youngalgy.com/alpha/*, 308-redirects page paths here and still PROXIES /alpha/api/* to this deployment so links baked into already-sent emails (unsubscribe GET/POST, one-click List-Unsubscribe-Post) keep working. Old magic-link/email-change callbacks are NOT proxied — they survive only because browsers follow the 308 to /auth/callback AND https://youngalgy.com/alpha/auth/callback** stays in the Supabase redirect allowlist. Never remove that allowlist entry.

Stack

Layer	Tool
Framework	Next.js 16 (App Router, Turbopack)
Styling	Tailwind CSS 4 + CSS custom properties (10 themes)
Hosting	Vercel (project alpha)
DB / Auth	Supabase (project xpqxhdciaoicsnyyfshy in the "Algy" org)
AI	Claude Sonnet 5 (topic blurbs) + Claude Opus 4.8 (editor's note) via @anthropic-ai/sdk
Web search	Brave Search API ($5/mo free credit covers V0)
Payments	Stripe — dedicated Alpha account (acct_1TWfDlAhrDpDN9sH), not shared with Ava
Email	Resend — letters from "alpha." <alpha@everyday.report>, sign-in (Supabase SMTP) from noreply@everyday.report. Domain verified via Vercel DNS. Old sender was alpha@youngalgy.com (that domain now removed from Resend — free plan holds 1 domain).

Architecture highlights

• Theme-first onboarding — /theme is step 2 (right after /welcome). The chosen theme is applied app-wide via ThemeApplier (root layout) so every step from /name through /checkout adopts the user's palette. ThemeApplier reads from public.users for signed-in users, falls back to localStorage for mid-funnel users.
• Shared topic_blurbs cache (lib/engine/blurb-cache.ts) — generate each topic-week's content once in Supabase, serve to every subscriber. ~10× cost reduction vs. naive per-user generation.
• Onboarding-first funnel (10 screens, no public landing) — welcome → theme → name → city → role → focus → topics → fun → email → checkout. Conversion play borrowed from Headway/Noom.
• Auto-sign-in after checkout — /api/generate calls admin.generateLink once to create the auth user; /writing redirects through that link to set the session cookie via /auth/callback. User lands on /inbox already signed in. The magic link is invisible to the user — never surfaced in an email.
• Returning sign-in: 6-digit code — /signin uses Supabase signInWithOtp + verifyOtp({ type: "email" }). Magic Link template is overridden with {{ .Token }} only. No clickable email links for returning users.
• RLS-by-default — every PII table (users, issues, support_tickets) has policies scoped to auth.uid(). Service role bypasses RLS for server-side operations (webhook upsert, generate persistence, admin endpoint).
• Admin Accounts panel at /settings/accounts — gated to youngalgy@gmail.com via server-side session check. List, grant free subscription, revoke free, delete. Real Stripe customers protected from accidental revoke.
• In-app changelog at /settings/changelog — hand-curated entries in app/settings/changelog/page.tsx. Server-rendered, noindex meta, private behind /settings (already in robots.ts disallow).

Directory layout

app/
  welcome / theme / name / city / role / focus / topics / fun / email / checkout   onboarding funnel
  writing                                                                          generate progress UI
  inbox / inbox/[issueId] / archive                                                 letter reading
  settings / settings/accounts / settings/changelog                                 account, admin, what's new
  signin / privacy / terms / support / not-found                                   static + sign-in
  api/
    generate                  Claude pipeline (rate-limited, zod-validated, persists issue + user, sends first-letter email)
    support                   support form → Supabase + email notify
    stripe/checkout           creates Stripe Checkout Session (success_url uses NEXT_PUBLIC_APP_URL)
    stripe/webhook            handles checkout.session.completed (upsert), sub events
    stripe/portal             customer-portal session for billing self-service
    admin/users               admin GET list + POST delete/grant_free/revoke_free (email gate)
    health                    uptime + env-var presence + active email provider
  auth/callback               Supabase magic-link handler — client page, handles BOTH PKCE + implicit flows
  robots.ts / sitemap.ts      SEO

components/
  ThemeApplier                applies user's theme to <html data-theme> on every route
  Digest                      letter render
  ThemeSwitcher               in-app theme switcher (not used in V1 — settings does this now)
  AudioToggle / ReadingProgress / LetterTOC / ScrollFadeIn
  FirstLetterCelebration / InstallPrompt / Footer / LegalLayout
  onboarding/StepShell / ProgressDots / QuestionStep

lib/
  types.ts                    canonical app types (Issue, UserProfile, ItemKind, ThemeId, TopicId)
  topics.ts                   25-topic registry (latest add: trading-cards, 2026-06-10)
  themes.ts                   10-theme registry
  audio.ts                    Web Audio synth sound palette
  onboarding-state.ts         localStorage state + ONBOARDING_STEPS ordering
  user-sync.ts                Supabase user sync + delete-account
  rate-limit.ts               in-memory IP bucket
  stripe.ts                   product/price constants (new Alpha account)
  email.ts                    Resend sender + HTML/text renderers (letter + welcome)
  brave.ts                    Brave Search client
  supabase/                   client.ts / server.ts / types.ts
  engine/
    types.ts                  TopicSignal / TopicBlurb / DigestSection
    mock-signals.ts           hand-written fallback signal for each topic
    topic-queries.ts          Brave queries per topic
    source-resolver.ts        Brave-first + mock fallback
    topic-blurb.ts            Claude synthesis prompt for one section
    editor-note.ts            Claude synthesis prompt for the personalized intro
    blurb-cache.ts            Supabase-backed (topic, week_of) cache
    assemble.ts               full Issue assembly
    persist.ts                find-or-create auth user + upsert profile + issue (returns magicLink)
    client.ts                 Anthropic SDK wrapper

supabase/migrations/          schema migrations (applied via dashboard SQL editor)
public/                       favicon + manifest + static assets
proxy.ts                      Supabase session refresh middleware (renamed from middleware.ts for Next 16)

Environment

Required for full functionality (see .env.local):

ANTHROPIC_API_KEY=             # Claude
RESEND_API_KEY=                # Email (sole provider)
RESEND_FROM="alpha." <alpha@everyday.report>
STRIPE_SECRET_KEY=             # Stripe (Alpha account)
STRIPE_WEBHOOK_SECRET=         # whsec_... for the webhook endpoint
BRAVE_SEARCH_API_KEY=          # Brave Search
NEXT_PUBLIC_SUPABASE_URL=
NEXT_PUBLIC_SUPABASE_PUBLISHABLE_KEY=
SUPABASE_SECRET_KEY=
NEXT_PUBLIC_APP_URL=https://alpha.everyday.report  # canonical origin for Stripe URLs + ALL email links
UNSUBSCRIBE_SECRET=            # HMAC secret for unsubscribe + letter-view tokens
CRON_SECRET=                   # bearer for /api/cron/weekly-send (Vercel Cron sends it)
SUPPORT_FORWARD_EMAIL=         # where /api/support notifications go (optional)
NEXT_PUBLIC_POSTHOG_KEY=       # analytics (optional — inert if unset)

GET /api/health returns which services are configured + active email provider.

Development

npm run dev     # localhost:3003
npm run build
npm run lint

Hot-reload across app/, components/, lib/.

Deployment

Pushes to master auto-deploy via Vercel Git integration. For manual deploys:

vercel deploy
# preview URL printed
vercel promote <preview-url>   # explicit promote — confirms before swapping prod

The youngalgy.com portfolio repo (YoungAlgy/youngalgy) 308-redirects youngalgy.com/alpha/* page paths to alpha.everyday.report/* and proxies /alpha/api/* to this deployment (old email links).

Operational notes

• Stripe — dedicated Alpha account, fully Alpha-branded checkout. FOUNDER coupon (100%-off forever, owner-curated promo codes) for testing.
• Email — Resend is the sole provider. Letters send as "alpha." <alpha@everyday.report>; Supabase sign-in emails (custom SMTP through Resend) send as "alpha." <noreply@everyday.report>. The everyday.report sending domain is verified via records in the Vercel-managed DNS zone (npx vercel dns ls everyday.report).
• Supabase — free tier in "Algy" org. Daily traffic prevents the 7-day idle pause.

Project memory

Plan + decisions tracked at:

• ~/.claude/plans/ally_app_plan_2026-05-13.md — original plan doc
• ~/.claude/projects/C--Users-Algernon/memory/project_ally_app.md — locked decisions
• ~/.claude/projects/C--Users-Algernon/memory/feedback_alpha_brand_independence.md — visual independence rule
• ~/.claude/projects/C--Users-Algernon/memory/feedback_alpha_changelog.md — keep /settings/changelog current after every user-visible ship

Commits

See git log — semver-style v0.X commit messages with structured notes.