Daily focus
Three wins, one reward, a clear next action. The day fits on one screen and does not demand more than you can give.
Self-hosted productivity CMS
Forge your focus.
A self-hosted productivity CMS designed to turn goals into daily actions, visible progress and rewarding momentum.
Focus Forge gives you a personal command center for your goals, projects, tasks, notes, templates, plugins and AI-powered workflows — without locking your productivity inside a closed platform.
The problem
Productivity tools are everywhere. Focus is not.
You have a todo app, a notes app, three dashboards, a project board, a scratch doc, an AI tab open in another window, a calendar that nobody really opens, and a stack of bookmarks that grows faster than you read. Each tool is fine on its own. Together, they leave you with the same question every morning:
« What should I actually do now? »
Focus Forge is built around that one question. It assumes you already have ideas, drive and goals — what you need is a single, calm place that converts them into the next concrete move, without making you feel guilty about the rest.
The solution
One cockpit for your goals, projects and daily focus.
Eight modular building blocks. One coherent system. All self-hosted, yours to extend.
Goals
Long-term goals broken down into objectives, milestones and visible progress bars — never frozen in a Notion page nobody reopens.
Projects
Lightweight project spaces with tasks, notes and links, designed to be skimmed, not maintained as a second job.
Notes
Structured but free. Tag, link, search. Optional AI assist when you want, never in the way when you don't.
Templates
Dashboards, workflows, weekly plans — cloneable starting points. Pick one, adapt it, ship your own.
Plugins
Calendar, RSS, GitHub, music release planner, server monitor, prompt library — extend Focus Forge instead of replacing it.
AI blocks
Bring your own keys. Compose blocks that draft, summarize or plan, with explicit scopes and zero hidden calls.
Rewards
A reward of the day, unlocked by your own wins. Small, real, visible — because momentum needs to feel like something.
The Focus Engine
The differentiator at the heart of Focus Forge.
It turns vague ambitions into something you can actually act on today, without burning out tomorrow.
01
Choose what matters.
Pick one objective of the moment. Not five. The Focus Engine routes the rest of the system around it.
02
Break it into daily wins.
Each day you get three concrete wins, generated from your goal — small enough to start, real enough to count.
03
Reward progress immediately.
A reward of the day is set in the morning and unlocks when you finish your wins. The brain notices, the streak builds.
04
Keep momentum without guilt.
Focus Points and Momentum visualize what you did, never what you missed. Bad days are skipped, not punished.
05
Light Day Mode.
Low energy? Switch to a calmer plan: 1 win, no timer, no streak penalty. The system adapts to humans, not the other way around.
06
I'm Stuck mode.
One button. Two-minute action. The Focus Engine generates the smallest possible move so you can restart without thinking.
⏱ Focus timer
⊕ Anti-paralysis prompts
◐ Session journal
↺ Weekly review
Self-hosted
Own your system. Own your data.
Focus Forge runs on your VPS, your homelab or your laptop. Your goals, your rituals and your notes never leave the machines you control.
- ✓ Install on any VPS in minutes
- ✓ Run locally with Docker for fully offline use
- ✓ No forced closed ecosystem, no vendor lock-in
- ✓ Bring your own AI keys — OpenAI, Anthropic, local
- ✓ Private by design, no hidden telemetry
- ✓ Exportable data, scheduled backups
- ✓ Full admin control — settings, users, plugins
# clone & spin up
git clone https://github.com/artofdev/focus-forge.git
cd focus-forge
docker compose up -d
# open the installer
open http://localhost:3000/install
Installer flow coming soon
Familiar, on purpose
Install it like WordPress. Extend it like a platform.
Focus Forge keeps the install ritual you already know — point at a server, run a wizard, get an admin — and pairs it with a modern, plugin-aware core built for the next decade of self-hosted software.
1
Web installer
Point a browser, follow the wizard.
2
Setup wizard
Database, locale, base preferences.
3
Admin account
Create your first admin in seconds.
4
Theme selection
Pick your visual identity from day one.
5
First dashboard template
Start from a real, opinionated layout.
6
Plugin manager
Browse, install, enable, scope.
7
Template manager
Clone, fork, version your templates.
8
Update center
Stay current, stay safe.
9
Safe mode & backups
Recover from anything, on purpose.
Ecosystem
Built for an ecosystem.
Focus Forge is shipped as a core, not a closed product. Templates, plugins and themes are first-class citizens. A developer SDK and a marketplace will follow.
Templates
Dashboards, layouts, workflows — cloneable starting points.
- Creator Dashboard
- Developer Cockpit
- ADHD Daily Focus
- Freelancer OS
- Weekly Planner
- Startup Builder
Plugins
Connect Focus Forge to the rest of your stack.
- RSS Reader
- Calendar Connector
- GitHub Issues
- YouTube Planner
- Music Release Planner
- Server Monitor
- AI Prompt Library
Themes
Visual identities that fit how you actually work.
- Focus Dark
- Clean Light
- Creative Neon
- Minimal Zen
Developer SDK and marketplace planned for Phase 6 & 7.
Update Center
Safe updates, compatibility alerts and rollback.
Self-hosted software earns trust through how it updates. Focus Forge treats updates as a first-class workflow, not a footnote.
- ✓ Update notifications and changelog
- ✓ Compatibility checks for plugins, templates and themes
- ✓ Automatic backup before update
- ✓ Signed packages from the official channel
- ✓ Safe mode boot to recover from a bad install
- ✓ One-click rollback to the previous version
- ✓ Security advisories surfaced in the admin
Update available
Focus Forge 0.12.0 from 0.11.4
- Added Light Day Mode
- Fixed Reward unlock race condition
- Better Plugin permission UI
✓ 14 plugins compatible
! 1 theme needs update
✓ Backup will run automatically
Trust & safety
Designed with safety in mind from day one.
Focus Forge is built so a small team can operate it confidently for years. The defaults are conservative, the permissions are explicit, the data is yours.
Locked installer after setup
The web installer disables itself once your admin exists, so it cannot be re-run from the outside.
Plugin permissions
Each plugin declares scopes. You see them, approve them, revoke them — designed to make « surprise » calls hard.
Verified developers
Marketplace authors will be identified and packages signed, so you know what is running and who shipped it.
Backup & restore
Snapshots before updates, scheduled backups, exportable archives — so a bad week never costs a year.
No hidden telemetry
If anything is sent home, you see it in the admin and you can turn it off. Defaults are minimal on purpose.
Health checks
An admin dashboard shows storage, queues, plugin status and known issues, designed to spot trouble early.
Roadmap
Where Focus Forge is going.
Public, honest, and shipped in phases. No vague « coming this year ». Each phase has a clear deliverable.
-
1
Public website
In progress- focusforge.space landing page
- Project story, vision, baseline
- Build in public communication
-
2
Visual demo
Next- demo.focusforge.space
- Premium dashboard mockup
- Focus Engine prototype, clickable
-
3
MVP app
Q3- Authentication, goals, daily tasks
- Rewards, projects, notes
- Responsive PWA
-
4
Installer
Q4- Docker setup
- Web installer & setup wizard
- First admin and theme selection
-
5
Update Center
2027- Version checks & compatibility alerts
- Safe update flow
- Backups and rollback
-
6
Developer ecosystem
Later- docs.focusforge.space
- Plugin handbook, template handbook
- Starter kits and SDK
-
7
Marketplace
Vision- Verified developers
- Free and premium components
- Licensing & updates
Build in public
Built in public.
Focus Forge is also a YouTube series. Real product design, real architecture decisions, real bugs. No edits that hide the messy parts.
- ✓ Product design from a blank page
- ✓ Self-hosted software, the modern way
- ✓ Building a productivity CMS, end to end
- ✓ A WordPress-style installer, but for 2026
- ✓ Plugin ecosystem and developer SDK
- ✓ AI workflows that respect your data
- ✓ Focus and motivation systems for real humans
Episode 01 · Coming soon
Designing a productivity CMS that doesn't feel like another to-do app.
Stop stacking tools. Start forging focus.
The full app and demo are in active development. Bookmark, follow the build, and be the first to install Focus Forge on your own server.
demo.focusforge.space
docs.focusforge.space
developers.focusforge.space
support.focusforge.space
marketplace.focusforge.space