Purpose and Demographic
✦ Mission Statement
To provide a robust, scholarly-grade editor that enables domain experts to compare multiple textual witnesses and produce accurate collated and critical editions with justifications and export-ready formats.
✦ Target Demographic
Textual scholars, Buddhist studies researchers, critical editors, philologists, and institutions involved in textual preservation and publication of Buddhist scriptures and classical texts.
✦ Problem Statement
Traditional methods of producing collated and critical editions are time-intensive and error-prone. There is a lack of domain-specific, digital tools to streamline witness alignment, variant collation, and editorial documentation in the context of Buddhist textual traditions.
Product Objectives
✦ Core Objectives
- Enable multi-witness alignment with a user-friendly interface
- Automate detection and entry of textual variants
- Support footnote and apparatus entry
- Provide structured editorial justifications for variant selections
- Export collated and critical editions in TEI-XML, Markdown, and PDF
✦ Non-Goals
- Will not generate commentary or translations automatically
- Will not verify authenticity or historical accuracy of witnesses
- Will not provide generalized text-editing tools unrelated to textual scholarship
✦ Impact Areas
- Democratizes the creation of critical editions within Buddhist and academic communities
- Enhances scholarly workflow through digital assistance
- Contributes to preservation and rigorous representation of textual traditions
Example Use Cases
✦ Use Case: [Dr. Tenzin, Buddhist Textual Scholar]
- Aligns five witnesses of a Prajnaparamita manuscript.
- Inserts apparatus notes and editorial decisions for publication.
✦ Use Case: [Karma, Digital Humanities Editor]
- Reviews variant readings and exports a collated edition to TEI.
- Collaborates remotely with peer editors and tracks changes.
Architectural Considerations
✦ Tech Stack
- Frontend: React (with Zustand/Redux, Tailwind CSS)
- Backend: FastAPI (Python)
- Database: PostgreSQL (witnesses, apparatus, metadata)
- Authentication: OAuth2 or Auth0 (optional)
- Deployment: Docker, Render/AWS
✦ System Diagram
User → React UI → FastAPI (REST endpoints) → PostgreSQL + File System (text witnesses & annotations)
✦ Security & Privacy
- Access-controlled endpoints for text editing and collaboration
- Revision history and change logs
- Secure token-based authentication
✦ Dependencies
- CollateX or in-house collation engine
- PDF/TEI/XML export libraries
- Git integration (optional, for version tracking)
✦ Scalability & Maintenance
- Stateless FastAPI services for horizontal scaling
- Frontend component-based design for rapid UI iteration
- Automated CI/CD with GitHub Actions
Participants
✦ Working Group Members
- Tashi – Product Owner
- Kunsang – Lead Frontend Engineer
- Lobsang – Backend Developer (FastAPI)
- Sangmo – UI/UX Designer
- Rinzin – Textual Scholar & Advisor
✦ Stakeholders
- OpenPecha Core Team
- Partner Institutions (e.g., BDRC, academic presses)
✦ Point of Contact
Tashi (tashi@openpecha.org)
Project Status
✦ Current Phase
UI design & backend API prototyping
✦ Milestones
- July 2025 – Working demo for internal review
- August 2025 – User testing with 2-3 scholars
- October 2025 – Public beta release with export support
✦ Roadmap
- Q3 2025 – Core features: alignment, collation, TEI export
- Q4 2025 – Collaborative features and editorial justification interface
- Q1 2026 – PDF/Markdown export, multilingual interface
Meeting Times
✦ Regular Schedule
Every Wednesday at 6PM IST via Zoom
✦ Meeting Notes
[Google Docs/Notion link to running minutes]
What We’re Working On
We maintain a public task board with all active issues and discussions.
