What is chttp

What is chttp

chttp is a minimal async-first HTTP router for node:http, authored inside the scriptc compilable subset so the same source also compiles to a single native ELF.

import { createRouter } from "@chttp/router";

const app = createRouter();
app.get("/user/:id", async (c) => c.json(await fetchUser(c.req.param("id"))));
app.serve({ port: 3000 });

Why it exists

  • Small: zero runtime dependencies, one core file.
  • Async-first: handlers and middleware may return a Promise. Sync handlers still finish without scheduling a microtask.
  • Two targets, one source: run on node, or compile to a ~1 MB native binary with a 3 ms cold start.

Mental model

  • An App holds a route trie. Routes are registered per method and path.
  • A request is matched, then runs a chain: middleware, then one handler.
  • Handlers write through c (c.json, c.text, c.html, c.redirect), which sets status, headers and ends the response.
  • Any throw or rejection in the chain lands in app.onError.
  • Request access is synchronous: the body is pre-buffered, so c.req.body() never awaits.

Node or native

node native ELF
Build step none scriptc build
Cold start 83 ms 3 ms
RSS after 100k req 116 MB 4 MB
npm ecosystem all of it scriptc subset only

Pick node for the ecosystem, native for small images and fast starts. Numbers and method: Benchmarks.

Utility packages for chttp apps — including when compiled to a native ELF — live in sigilco/cutils: @cutils/sqlite (embedded SQLite over a C FFI shim) and @chttp/cache (LRU/TTL in-memory cache). @chttp/mcp (JSON-RPC 2.0 MCP server) and @chttp/auth (session/JWT/OAuth/CSRF/TOTP primitives) live in this repo — see MCP server and Auth primitives.

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