OpenTao

Read all 81 chapters across Chinese, literary, plain-English, and historical views.
Open the reader · Editorial method · Contributing

OpenTao is a phrase-aligned reader for all 81 chapters of the Daodejing (Tao Te Ching). Read the received Chinese text alongside multiple English views, then open textual notes, key terms, cross-references, and commentary for each chapter.

What is included

• OpenTao — a literary, line-conscious translation
• Plain English — a direct modern rendering
• James Legge (1891) — a public-domain historical translation
• Compare — OpenTao and Legge in one reading view
• Phrase-level alignment between the Chinese text and the OpenTao and plain-English renderings
• Shareable chapter and translation-mode URLs, plus light, dark, and scroll reading themes

The reader is a static client-side application. Chapter data is loaded from the same site, so no account or server-side service is required.

Text and editorial method

The received Chinese text comes from the Chinese Text Project, identified there as ctp:dao-de-jing. James Legge's translation comes from Project Gutenberg Ebook #216.

The OpenTao renderings were made for this project. They preserve lineation, repetition, and productive ambiguity where readable English permits. The plain-English view states the same reading with less literary compression. Translation notes identify consequential grammar, received-text variants, and key-term decisions rather than presenting one English wording as final.

Run locally

Requirements: Node.js 20.19 or newer and npm.

git clone https://github.com/michael-berardi/opentao.git
cd opentao
npm ci
npm run dev

Open http://localhost:5173 in your browser. For a production-style local preview:

npm run validate:content
npm run build
npm run preview

The content validator checks all 81 chapter files, 573 aligned segments, required commentary fields, cross-reference bounds, sequential segment IDs, and source-text hashes. npm run lint runs the repository's static checks.

Contributing

Pull requests and focused content corrections are welcome. Before opening a pull request:

1. Run npm ci and make the smallest focused change.
2. Run npm run validate:content, npm run lint, and npm run build.
3. Preserve source attributions and update the relevant license when changing source or editorial content.

Content changes should keep chapter numbers, segment IDs, and the validator's source-text integrity checks consistent. Please explain translation or commentary changes with the relevant textual evidence.

Privacy and security

OpenTao has no accounts, forms, analytics, advertising, or third-party runtime requests. It stores the selected translation mode and reading theme in your browser's localStorage; clearing site data removes those preferences. Chapter content is fetched from the OpenTao site origin.

Please do not disclose security vulnerabilities in a public issue. Use GitHub's private vulnerability reporting for this repository when available; otherwise contact the maintainers through GitHub.

Licenses

Source code is available under the MIT License. OpenTao translation and commentary are available under CC BY 4.0. The ancient Chinese text is public domain. James Legge's 1891 translation is public domain in the United States; status can vary by jurisdiction.