I built a terminal portfolio using React and Ink -- animated header, tabbed navigation, streaming bio text, the works. It looked great locally, but the real question was: how do I let other people see it?

The SSH Approach

The answer: run it as an SSH server. When someone types ssh r-that.com, they get connected to a Node.js process that renders a fresh Ink app instance to their terminal. No browser needed, no client to install.

The Implementation

The server uses the ssh2 npm package to accept SSH connections:

const server = new Server({ hostKeys: [hostKey] }, (client) => {
  client.on('session', (accept) => {
    const session = accept();
    session.on('shell', (accept) => {
      const channel = accept();
      // Render Ink to the SSH channel
      render(<Portfolio />, { stdout, stdin, interactive: true });
    });
  });
});

The tricky parts were:

• Stream bridging: Ink expects Node.js WriteStream objects, but SSH gives you a channel. I had to implement cursorTo, clearLine, and moveCursor using raw ANSI escape sequences.
• Newline handling: Terminals expect \r\n over SSH, but Ink outputs bare \n. A simple regex replacement fixed the stair-stepping.
• Color support: Chalk detects color support from process.stdout, not the SSH stream. Setting FORCE_COLOR=3 before imports and chalk.level = 3 after forces truecolor output.

Deployment

The server runs on a Hostinger VPS as a systemd service. Admin SSH was moved to port 2200, freeing port 22 for the portfolio. A Cloudflare DNS A record points r-that.com to the VPS IP (with proxy disabled -- Cloudflare doesn't proxy SSH).

The result: anyone with a terminal can run ssh r-that.com and browse an interactive, animated portfolio.