GUI toolkits
Draw widgets well
But leave the data to you: no live tables, no incremental sorting or grouping, no streaming.
About
An open platform for real-time data.
densa exists so that software full of live data can be built from one stack designed for it, in the open, with guarantees that are tested rather than claimed.
01 — Why
Data-heavy software is built from parts never designed together.
Teams that build screens following thousands of values every second assemble them from separate pieces, and pay for every seam between them.
Data engines
Process data superbly
Arrow, DataFusion, Polars and DuckDB, then stop at a result set. Showing it live is someone else's problem.
Web dashboards
Reach every browser
But run with a garbage collector between the data and the screen, and struggle beyond thousands of updates a second.
densa
One native stack
Arrow from end to end: live data structures, views that update incrementally, and a GPU interface that never allocates while it draws.
02 — Principles
What will not change.
Measured, not claimed
Every performance figure names its hardware; every guarantee is a test.
Nothing allocates per frame
Startup and changes may allocate; drawing, scrolling and steady state may not.
Arrow from end to end
Data stays in Arrow's columnar form from the source to the screen, shared rather than copied.
Libraries first
Every layer is a set of crates usable on its own; the flagship application uses only public APIs.
No domain in the core
Core crates know nothing of markets or sensors; applications bring their domain through generic interfaces.
Native first
Desktop on Linux, macOS and Windows first; the browser follows on the same code.
03 — Open source
How densa is run.
densa is developed in public by the densa-rs organization on GitHub. Everything that ships is in its repositories, and every change runs the same checks.
- 01
License
MIT or Apache-2.0, at your option. Contributions are accepted under the same terms.
Read → - 02
Development
In the open on GitHub, with continuous integration on Linux, macOS and Windows for every change.
GitHub → - 03
Contributing
Issues, ideas and pull requests are welcome; the guide explains how changes are reviewed and tested.
Guide → - 04
Security
Report vulnerabilities privately through GitHub's private vulnerability reporting, never in a public issue.
Policy → - 05
Conduct
Every densa space follows the code of conduct.
Read → - 06
Brand
The densa name and mark, with the files and rules for using them.
Assets → - 07
Contact
Questions, partnerships and anything that does not fit an issue: write to bo@densa.dev.
Email →