Root cause (interlude, owner 2026-09-25): keyboard-shortcuts dispatches
registry actions on the lh:kbd-<action> convention, but the sidebar's
listener sat on the pre-convention name "lh:toggle-sidebar" — a name
nothing ever dispatches, so ⌘B silently did nothing while its tooltip
and cheat-sheet row kept claiming the binding. A sweep of every lh:
listener confirmed the sidebar was the lone stray (chat-renamed and
graph-revision are deliberate non-kbd events).
Fix, structural: kbdEventForAction(action) exported from
src/core/keyboard.ts — the ONE spelling — and both sides compose
through it (dispatcher's default branch, sidebar's toggle listener);
keyboard-shortcuts re-exports the helper so the contract pin can assert
no second spelling exists. The mismatch is now impossible by
construction.
Thinking pill: label trimmed to "Thinking" with its real shortcut via
the registry-composition path — "Thinking (⇧⇥)" (cycle-thinking,
rebind-live like every Hint suffix).
Pins (tests/keyboard-toggle-sidebar.test.ts): the full chain — mod+b →
actionForBinding → toggle-sidebar → kbdEventForAction →
lh:kbd-toggle-sidebar; formatBinding("shift+tab") → ⇧⇥; the
dispatcher-imports-the-same-helper contract.
Live-verified on :3001: ⌘B visually toggles on home, /chat/[id], and
/chat/new (sidebar 0↔288px, hamburger slot 0↔36); with the rebind
lh:keymap {"toggle-sidebar":"mod+j"}: ⌘J toggles and ⌘B is inert
(rebind-live); thinking pill renders "Thinking (⇧⇥)"; keymap restored,
sidebar left open.
Owner round 2026-09-25, over 09c0f6e. The wave's tooltips read as
distracting; this round makes them quiet:
- Delay: TOOLTIP_DELAY_MS = 500 in the primitive — tooltips appear when
you pause on a control, never in passing (Radix focus-opens stay
instant by design; keyboard users don't wait).
- Vanish on leave: disableHoverableContent — the chip is un-hoverable,
so the instant the cursor leaves the trigger it's gone, even mid-move
onto the chip's own pixels.
- Look: bg-accent (#2a2a2a, the hover-chip tone) instead of the white
bg-foreground slab; 11px; px-2 py-1; arrow culled (nothing purely
decorative); text-foreground/85.
- Suffix: parentheses, not em-dash — "Dictate (⌘D)"; the registry
source unchanged (still override-aware).
- Drops (owner-selected): send square, start square, stats summary —
the icons/numbers describe themselves.
- Home logo kept but to the RIGHT with its real shortcut "Home (⌘G)"
(jump-graph routes to /, the same destination).
- Trims: "Model selector (⌘K)", "Thinking level", "Graph costs —
click for details", "How much of this session isn't mapped yet".
- Added: Import Notes gets "Import notes into the graph" — the one
button whose destination wasn't obvious.
Pins: TOOLTIP_DELAY_MS=500; hintText parens expectations updated.
Live-verified on :3001 — 508ms hover delay measured, close within 10ms
of pointerout, chip styles probed (rgb(42,42,42), 11px, 4px/8px), arrow
gone, all new labels + sides confirmed, drops carry no tooltip and no
aria-describedby.
Owner-approved full pass (tooltip wave, 2026-09-25). Mechanism: icon/pill
controls ride the styled Radix tooltip via a new Hint composition
(components/ui/hint.tsx) — the shared primitive adopted as-is, no
restyling; the shortcut appends as an em-dash suffix off the LIVE registry
(a rebind in Settings → Keyboard changes the suffix): "Dictate — ⌘D".
Surface-owned keys (Esc closes, Enter submits) ride a raw binding prop.
Native title= stays only for truncation-reveals (dock spans, the rename
field) and menu-interior abbreviations (MenuShell untouched). One
em-dash pattern; per-state truth on the send square (busy = "Stop the
reply — Esc", idle = "Send — ↵"), Enter on the plan verdict's accept,
"Stop dictation (Esc)" kept verbatim per the owner's flag.
Copy: the dev-speak cull — no pipeline/prober/tier/wave vocabulary
anywhere a user reads. New pins in tests/tooltip-mechanism.test.tsx
(hintText composition, asChild no-wrapper-DOM, the auto-update hint
constant); dock truncation titles pinned native; graph-chrome + settings
pins updated to the new copy.
Live-verified on :3001 — 12.6ms hover appearance (no native 1s lag);
glyphs render on every suffixed surface (⌘D, ⌘K, ⌘⇧F, ⌘,, ⌘B, F2, ↵,
Esc); per-page probes confirm Settings entry, Home logo, session search,
Start session, Close sidebar, model + thinking pills, stats summary,
rename title, plan chip, coverage ring, send square, cost button, node
search (⌘F), graph gear, settings close (Close — Esc), keyboard section
"Fixed — part of this screen", auto-update hint, light-mode "Coming
soon", the three slot rosters, graph-tools hint. Esc still closes the
settings dialog.
Five small fixes (owner refinement round, 2026-09-24):
1. RING POPOVER OPENS DOWN: the ring lives in the chat top bar —
the window's top edge is right above it, so the upward popover was
clipped. top-full mt-1.5 now: it drops below the ring.
2. SESSION MENU ORDER FLIPPED: Rename/Delete first, hairline, then
the extraction coverage block + Extract at the bottom — the info
reads after the actions (was the reverse, the block on top).
3. UNIT TYPED OUT: the sidebar block reads "2k tok uncovered" now —
the tokens unit is explicit (owner: "tok").
4. MARKDOWN LIST INDENT: streamdown ships list-inside with no
container padding — top-level markers sat ON the text edge (only
nested lists got their pl-6 via [li_&]). .lh-prose :where(ul, ol)
{ padding-left: 1.5rem } indents both list kinds as blocks, 24px —
the same measure as the nested-case pl-6. Unlayered CSS beats the
utility layer; :where keeps specificity zero.
5. THINKING LEVELS LOWERCASE EVERYWHERE: the composer pill and setup
dialog rendered THINKING_LABEL (Off/Minimal/…/Max) while every
menu body renders the raw lowercase level — the map is now
lowercase, the level string IS the display form, everywhere.
Live-verified on :3001: list content inset 24px vs paragraphs
(padding-left computed 24px, nested fine); the composer pill reads
"low" with options low/high/max; menu order Rename → Delete… →
hairline → block. 901/901.
The owner-locked extraction-UX redesign (dispatch 2026-09-24), UI
chunk over Platform's data layer (eed4b4e — GET /api/chats/[id]
carries `coverage`, the threshold is Graph ▸ extractionChunkTokens):
1. SIDEBAR BLOCK (components/extraction-coverage.tsx +
sidebar's session menu): the coverage info block at the TOP of
the context menu — uncovered tokens, uncovered messages, running
state — then the Extract affordance (optimistic "extracting… /
Running" until the server says running; 409 = benign, the trigger
raced us), fetched ON MENU OPEN (the block mounts with the menu —
on-demand, never eagerly), polled at 2s while a run is in flight.
Visually separated from Rename/Delete by a hairline; those stay
the two session-management actions. Failed read → nothing (never
fake zeros).
2. RING METER (CoverageRing, chat top bar, before the PhaseChip):
a 16px donut filling uncoveredTokens / extractionChunkTokens —
"how close this session is to its next extraction run". Click →
the exact numbers (covered/uncovered tokens, messages, the
threshold, lastFoldedAt via timeAgo). Refresh chains: mount, the
turn-settle bump (chat.tsx coverageTick), the settings signal
(threshold/kill-switch re-read live), a 2s drain-poll while a run
is in flight, and the ACTIVITY FEED — a run for this session
appearing or settling in the dock's feed re-reads coverage (runs
fire from other surfaces — the sidebar menu, the turn pipeline —
and no turn-settle bump announces them; the runs-empty-transition
the graph view rides). Vanishes entirely when the graph is off or
before the first honest read. Running = the whole ring PULSES
(implementer's visual call: motion is the working-state signal in
this app's quiet register).
3. PHASECHIP UN-PILL: the phase label is a flat tag — no border, no
rounding, no padding. The Plan chip is the only button-shaped
thing in the top bar. Drag-surface (pointer-events-none) and aria
semantics unchanged; the transcript PhaseDivider keeps its look.
4. PANEL DEATH: components/graph-coverage.tsx, its graph-view
mount, and tests/render-graph-coverage.test.tsx die whole.
Confirmed: after this, NOTHING client-side consumes GET
/api/graph/coverage — the only remaining client use of the
coverage endpoints is the Extract POST (kept, by design); the
routes stay (Platform's call).
Pure seams exported for tests: ringFill (clamp math),
CoverageMenuBody, CoverageRingGlyph, CoverageRingDetail.
901/901.
Live-verified on :3001: ring fill arcs match the API byte-for-byte
(483/4096 = 4.45/37.70; 1991/4096 = 18.32/37.70); the sidebar block
reads "2k uncovered / 4 messages unextracted"; a real Extract run
went optimistic → dock run → menu settled "fully extracted" AND the
ring drained to the empty arc (the feed chain); graph off → the ring
vanishes; the flat phase label renders chrome-free beside the Plan
pill.
Owner polish dispatch (2026-09-23):
- Right-click no longer pins a node or opens the detail card: the
canvas pointerdown/up handlers now gate on the primary button, so
the context menu arrives alone.
- Node context menu: label is just "Delete" and the shell hugs its
content (w-44 -> w-fit); the menu body keeps focus for arrow
cycling but never shows the browser's default focus ring
(outline-none on the MenuShell body - applies to every menu).
- Delete confirm: "Delete node?" title in CMU Serif, red
(text-destructive); the node name sits below in JetBrains Mono
inline-code; the Delete button carries the destructive treatment
(border + tint, fill deepens on hover). Rest of the dialog stays
neutral.
- Sidebar rename row: text and metadata stay at the idle row's x -
the status spacer and the input's border/padding are gone; the
underline is the only editing cue.
- Right-click any session row: MenuShell context menu, exactly two actions
(owner ruling): Rename and Delete… — MenuShell discipline (placement,
focus, arrow cycling, lh:menu-open announcements), agent-section's
outside-click/Esc contract with [data-lh-menu] carve-outs.
- Rename is INLINE in the row (owner ruling): select-all entry, Enter/blur
commits through the existing plumbing — PUT /api/chats/:id then
lh:chat-renamed. The open chat header now LISTENS for the event too, so
renaming the active session from the sidebar updates the header in place
(it only dispatched before).
- Delete opens the two-option dialog (locked design, DELETE_OPTIONS pure
seam for render pins): "Delete the session only" (preserve-graph — the
graph keeps every contribution) vs "Also remove its graph traces"
(delete-nodes — shared topics survive, only-this-session topics die).
409 turn_in_flight/jobs_running and 503 extraction_winding_down render
the server's line verbatim with a same-mode Try-again.
- Success: the sidebar patches its snapshot instantly, the active session
navigates home (chat unmounts — drafts die with it), and lh:graph-revision
announces the returned revision — the graph view refetches the snapshot
AND costs (deletion is the one writer the status poll can't see).
- ChatDeleteMode type re-exported through the core barrel (the shell's one
needed seam from core/graph-deletion.ts).
Gates: tsc clean, 909/909, lint 0, build ok. Live-verified on :3001:
context menu open/Esc, inline rename (row + API + active header), both
delete modes on scratch sessions, simulated 409 + retry-then-succeed,
active-session navigation home, graph+costs refetch deltas on home.
Chunk B (owner-designed, model-slots wave) on the merged engine surface
(main 1d66a17):
AGENT SECTION — SLOTS ONLY (owner ruling)
- The six per-role model rows are GONE; three slot rows instead:
Strong (Prober + Teacher), Cheap (five workhorse roles), Vision
(visual maker + PDF reader), roster + resolved-default in every hint.
- Slot dropdowns share the app's menu language over the FEDERATED
catalog (/api/models = keyed providers only, fresh per call — saving
a key in Keys immediately widens the picker); the vision slot
filters to image-capable models (Model.input); the menu's highlight
now matches provider+id (ids can collide across providers).
- Slots write the new models section (PUT /api/settings/models) through
the dialog's write seam; per-role overrides stay schema-only.
- ModelMenuList rows read 'provider · id' — federation makes the
provider bookkeeping-relevant. Usage stamps render provider-qualified
(prettyModel(qualified): 'Glm 5.3 Flash · openrouter') in the stats
bar's turn lines.
SEARCH ENGINE (search wave: no default, owner)
- A row in Tools: Tavily/Brave via the shared-menu look, Automatic =
the pin removed (auto-activation). The live reason line comes from
/api/search; no engine key at all grays the whole row + disables the
trigger (a keyless choice would only block auto-activation).
FIRST-RUN SETUP FLOW (owner design A: composer CTA + send interception)
- Chats cannot start until all three slots are picked — no defaults
for 33 providers (slotsConfigured: all three slot models required).
- The graph view's new-session dock (home) shows a 'Set up your models'
CTA while unconfigured; submitting a topic opens the SetupDialog WITH
THE DRAFT PRESERVED; Save stores the models section and the queued
message sends. Same interception on /chat/new sends.
- STAGED BY DEPENDENCY (owner: keys first, models after): no keyed
provider → stage 1 deep-links the settings dialog on Keys (open now
takes a section); a saved key reopens at stage 2 on the next submit.
- Stage 2: Strong → Cheap → Vision pickers (federated, vision-filtered,
all three required). Closable without configuring — browsing stays
possible; the gate is the send, not the dialog. Layered Esc: an open
slot menu eats Esc before the dialog.
- Two closure bugs caught live: onDone→start/send captured the stale
pre-save 'configured' (the flow now forces the replayed send); menu-Esc
used to close the whole dialog.
Settings-dialog provider: open(section?) lands on a section (stage 1
deep-link). Tests: composeSlotModel/composeSearchEngine pure, slot SSR
replacing role rows, slotsConfigured/setupStage first-run gates,
provider-qualified prettyModel. Gates: typecheck, lint, 792/792, build.
Round 1 (27d4f33) listed sidebar.tsx, keyboard-shortcuts.tsx,
app/settings/page.tsx and the globals.css keyframes in its message but
they were never staged. This commits exactly that content: the sidebar
Settings row as a button calling the dialog provider, the mod+, chord
opening the dialog, /settings redirecting to /chat/new, and the
settings-pop keyframes (reduced-motion aware). No new changes —
catch-up staging only. (next-env.d.ts churn left untracked-in-commit as
dev-server noise.)
The validation surface for the settings foundation — deliberately thin,
real read/write against the delta record, polish is a later wave.
Mount (owner decisions): dedicated page, single scroll; entry = sidebar
bottom row + ⌘/Ctrl+, (open-settings in the registry); chat defaults NOT
shown (they live on /chat/new); mode dark-only (light palette = design
wave); final tool list = research/demo/visual/pdf (master-adjudicated).
Sections (PUT /api/settings/[section], replace-whole per section):
- General: auto-update toggle.
- Agent: six background-role model+thinking selects (Default = config
pin; a stored id stays VISIBLE even when the catalog hasn't loaded or
dropped it — a select showing Default over a live override would lie),
the four tool toggles, prompt override switches (file-gated) with
source/override text editors over the segment routes.
- Appearance: applied LIVE as runtime CSS variables by an
AppearanceProvider at the root layout — proseFontSize → the one
reading-size var, fontFamily → --font-prose, background → --background
+ the derived raised/accent/edge palette (dark curve, today's exact
spacing: +8/+22/+47 per channel, clamped), sessionNameSerif →
--font-title (titles flip with ZERO chat.tsx edits), headingWeight →
new --lh-heading-weight token, bold/italic colors → the lh-ink vars.
Mode renders honestly DISABLED.
- Graph: the ladder grays a rung when any ANCESTOR is effectively off
(stored values persist, resolve inert — switch shows stored, graying
shows effective).
- Keyboard: view/rebind/reset over the registry; overrides persist in
lh:keymap and apply INSTANTLY (dispatcher reads per keydown); bare
modifier presses are ignored while armed; displayOnly actions list but
never rebind.
First-boot fix: {settings: null} is no-record, not fetch-failure.
CROSS-LANE (flagged for master): src/core/keyboard.ts gained the
open-settings action/binding and exports saveOverrides/loadOverrides
(one-liners; no existing pins); app/layout.tsx mounts the provider.
Live-verified: structure, record writes (general/tools/graph/appearance),
prose-size applying live (16→20px), rebind + chord navigation from
another page, ladder graying, no console errors. Gates: typecheck,
lint, 689/689 (28 new), build.
Owner live-test rounds on waves A/B:
- Alt+arrows no longer ALSO walk the question rows (dock ignores
alt/meta/ctrl combos; session cycling keeps them exclusively)
- question walk clamps at the ends — no wrap (faster to navigate)
- plain Tab toggles focus between the thinking field and the answer
rows (walked row by default); focus follows the walk while in the
rows; Shift+Tab stays the global thinking-level cycle
- Esc in the sessions search blurs back to normal (claims the key so
the window Esc chain does not fire)
- cheat sheet gains the Tab-in-question display entry
The shortcut architecture (owner-approved plan, 2026-09-17):
- src/keyboard.ts: pure action registry (id, label, scope, default
binding) + lh:keymap localStorage overrides + event normalization.
The settings milestone renders this same registry as its editor.
- components/keyboard-shortcuts.tsx: the single document-level keydown
listener (window level, bubble) owning the pieces no surface owns:
- Tab is DEAD (owner decision): browser tab-focus navigation is
abandoned; Tab is suppressed everywhere, Shift+Tab cycles the
thinking level.
- Esc is a layered dismiss: topmost popover first (popovers
stopPropagation their own Esc — usePopoverDismiss + ModelControl),
then dictation stop (lh:kbd-stop-dictation), then abort of an
in-flight turn (lh:kbd-abort-turn; server-side wake turns are
honestly non-stoppable — the seam only stops local streams).
- Global actions dispatch lh:kbd-<action> window events (the
lh:chat-renamed pattern); surfaces that aren't mounted simply
don't listen.
- The input guard: inside a typing surface only mod/alt combos (and
Tab) fire; bare keys pass through to the field.
- Cheat sheet overlay (?) renders from the registry, grouped by scope.
Bindings wired this wave: cmd+d dictation toggle, cmd+k model picker,
shift+tab thinking cycle, cmd+b sidebar, cmd+shift+f sessions search,
alt+up/down + alt+enter session cycling, cmd+g graph view, cmd+n new
session, f2 rename (chat), ? cheat sheet. Wave B adds the question
keyboard machine; wave C the per-surface bindings (find, import).
Verified live in the dev shell (CDP): all of the above via
Input.dispatchKeyEvent.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 4.5 plus-plus <noreply@anthropic.com>
The sidebar no longer squeezes the page when the window narrows; the
page itself never goes below a comfortable floor (owner decisions,
2026-09-17: 640px min, widen-window on toggle, auto-restore):
- minWidth 640 / minHeight 600 on the BrowserWindow (macOS enforces)
- Below SIDEBAR_AUTOCLOSE (928 = 640 + 288 sidebar) the sidebar
auto-closes, and auto-RESTORES when the window widens past it again —
both fall out of one expression: rendered = pref && !narrow, where
pref is the persisted user choice. Manual closes persist and stay
closed; auto-close never touches the preference.
- Opening the sidebar while narrow asks the shell to widen the window
to 928 first (new lh:expand-window IPC, preload.cjs contextBridge —
the renderer's first and only Electron bridge): the toggle is never a
dead button, and the layout never has to survive narrow + sidebar.
In the plain browser there is no suppression and no widening — a
narrow tab opens the sidebar if the user says so.
- Graph chrome row wraps: max-w-[calc(100%-9rem)] + flex-wrap keeps the
row clear of the header toggle cluster and stacks it onto extra lines
below ~640px instead of overflowing left.
State machine verified in the Electron dev shell across all six
transitions (auto-close, auto-restore, manual-close-persists,
reopen-widens, browser fallback, wrap at 640/500/360).
Traffic lights (owner report: 'way too low, not aligned with the phase pill'):
measured in the running app — circles centered at 30.75pt vs the pill box's
29.25pt (band 0-59.5, pill box 19-39.5, pill ink 28.75; uppercase glyphs sit
high). trafficLightPosition y 24 -> 22.5 lands the circle centers at 29.25,
exactly on the pill. Owner confirmed aligned after this change.
Rename escape hitbox (owner report): entering rename was already width-of-
title only, but the editing input spanned flex-1 so clicking the rest of the
bar stayed inside the input. The input is now shrink-to-fit
([field-sizing:content], min 8ch / max 70%) and any mousedown outside the
input blurs it, running the existing onBlur commit path; the header drops
lh-drag while renaming so the drag region cannot eat the escape click.
Verified: click-away commits (exactly one PUT), Escape discards, Enter
commits.
Phase pill is pure decoration (owner report: 'should not be interactable
in any way'): no tooltip, pointer-events-none, select-none — part of the
drag surface instead of a carved-out target.
Graph chrome was unclickable in Electron (owner report): home.tsx's
floating drag strip underlays the z-10 controls row, and Electron's
app-region mask ignores z-index, so the region ate their clicks (plain
browser unaffected — DOM hit-testing is fine). lh-no-drag carve-outs on
the chrome row and the node detail card (it is placed imperatively
anywhere, including the top strip).
LhMark home link now mirrors the ghost toggle: same size-9 chip geometry
and hover:bg-accent treatment.
The system title bar disappears (titleBarStyle hiddenInset +
trafficLightPosition {16,24}): the app's own 60px header bands become the
window's drag surface, and the traffic lights float over the sidebar's
mark band, vertically centered on the same line as the chat header's
phase pill (pixel-verified: circle centers y 24–36.5pt, pill box center
30pt).
- electron/main.cjs: hiddenInset chrome; dev shell (LH_DEV_URL) gets its
own userData (-dev suffix) so it never fights the packaged app's
single-instance lock — verified: the lock silently killed the dev
shell while the packaged app was open (that also proved the lock works
across separately-launched builds).
- app/globals.css: .lh-electron-gated utilities — drag/no-drag bands,
92px traffic-light gutter (.lh-lights-gutter / .lh-closed-toggle:
lights end ~75pt + the lights' own 16px edge inset as the gap),
home's floating strip becomes a drag surface only in the shell.
Everything is inert in the plain browser.
- sidebar.tsx: SidebarProvider sets <html class=lh-electron> post-mount
(UA detection; no hydration mismatch, absent in browser); LH wordmark
text replaced by the owner's mark (components/lh-mark.tsx, inlined
icon-no-padding.svg, 24px, home link kept); SidebarToggle gains the
92px margin when closed so it never slides under the static lights.
- chat.tsx: the rename hit-box shrinks to the title text itself —
flex-1 spanned the whole bar, so every click started a rename and the
window lost its grip. Shrink-to-fit + a flex-1 drag spacer (chips stay
right) + hover:bg-accent affordance (clear when hover renames vs
drags; -mx/px cancel for zero shift). The renaming input keeps flex-1
for edit room.
- home.tsx / new-session.tsx / phase-divider.tsx: drag bands + carve-outs.
Live-verified in the dev shell (pixel analysis) and headless browser:
lights/pill/mark centered, 17pt lights→mark gap, rename click→select-all
→Escape roundtrip, browser layout untouched.
Gates: typecheck, eslint, 500/500 tests, build.
Rename (owner ask): clicking the header title opens edit mode with the
whole title selected — typing replaces, arrows move inside. Enter or a
click away commits (PUT /api/chats/:id); Escape and an empty commit
discard. renameChat joins the ChatStore port; like saveSettings it is
NOT conversation activity — updatedAt stays put so sidebar order never
churns on a rename. The sidebar patch is instant: the header dispatches
lh:chat-renamed and SessionsSidebar folds it into its snapshot (the 2.5s
poll is only a backstop). Sidebar right-click rename is DELIBERATELY
deferred: it needs a real context-menu system, which gets its own pass
later (owner decision, 2026-09-17).
Graph chrome:
- The extraction-coverage button moves between search and import; the
gear keeps the far-right corner. Coverage still renders on an EMPTY
graph (that is exactly when it matters).
- The no-match search note no longer shifts its siblings: the chrome
row is items-start (every button is 44px tall, so top alignment pins
the row while the search container grows downward).
- Popovers dismiss properly: pointerdown anywhere outside the control's
root (button + panel) closes it, and so does Escape. Two panels can
never be open at once — the sibling chrome buttons are outside the open
root, so pointerdown closes the first before the click opens the
second. New shared hook components/popover-dismiss.ts, wired into
both the settings gear and the coverage control.
Gates: typecheck, eslint, 498/498 (+2 rename store tests), build.
Live-verified: select-all/focus/Enter/Escape/empty/blur round-trip,
updatedAt untouched, sidebar instant patch; chrome order + frozen
positions under a no-match query; popover close via canvas, search
input, Esc, mutual exclusion, toggle intact.
When the sidebar toggled, the header's toggle mounted/unmounted in a
single frame, so its 48px footprint (button + gap) popped and dragged
the title and chips sideways while the sidebar was still mid-slide —
'kind of masked by the motion, but very much noticeable.'
The toggle is now ALWAYS MOUNTED, owning a slot whose width+margin
animate in lockstep with the sidebar's own width transition (same
duration-200, same easing, both gated on mount so no load flash):
- when open the slot is exactly ZERO (w-0 with -mr-3 cancelling the
header's gap-3) — resting layouts are pixel-identical to the old
conditional render;
- the icon fades with the slot (opacity in the same 200ms) and is
clipped by it as the slot collapses — no popping in either direction;
hidden state is pointer-events-none, aria-hidden, tabIndex -1;
- the mount-gating rule grows to transition-[width,margin,opacity].
rAF-verified both directions: the title's x-path is monotone from
frame one (old bug teleported 48px in one frame; the margin blip
caught on the way is also gone), icon opacity eases 0.12→1 over the
slide. Gates: typecheck, lint, 469/469.
The header toggle's PanelLeftOpenIcon was size-5 while the sidebar's
close icon was size-4 — the button visibly grew when the sidebar closed.
The small look is the standard: both glyphs are size-4 in identical
size-9 boxes now.
Live: open glyph 16px, close glyph 16px, button boxes 36px both states.
Gates: typecheck, lint, 469/469.
Three declutter moves, all trivially reversible:
- The meta line drops the message count (idle meta is now just how long
ago). The count informed no decision — clutter. messageCount still
rides the API payload, so this is a one-line flip in sessionMeta if
it's ever wanted.
- The active row is marked by the background alone: weight was a second
channel doing the same job, and the flip made selected titles jump.
- Dates beyond the week render ISO (YYYY-MM-DD, zero-padded) instead of
M/D/YYYY — the US convention swapped for the international standard:
unambiguous in any locale, sorts lexically. A user-locale setting can
come later — it's a format-function swap.
Also dropped the row's vestigial text-sm: both lines carry explicit
sizes now (16px title, 11px meta).
Live: active weight 400 + bg-accent, metas '17m ago' /
'Waiting for your answer · 1d ago', no counts. Gates: typecheck, lint,
469/469.
The system: the ladder is the truth, everything snaps to it.
- Prose snaps to the ladder's 16px rung (--lh-prose-size 16.5→16; the
half-pixel was a reskin-era hand-tune with no visible payoff and a
system cost). lh-prose, lh-input, and the session titles all read the
one variable — one reading size, now a ladder citizen. @theme inline
inlines literals without emitting runtime vars, so the variable can't
var()-link to --text-lg: documented as the one deliberate duplication
(change one, change both).
- The 10px rung merges into 11px: one pixel apart was a distinction with
no visible difference, and 10px sits at the mono legibility floor —
quiet labels (Sessions, Background agents, dock hints, model-picker
footers) get their quiet from color + tracking, not a notch of size.
All 13 text-xxs uses → text-xs; --text-xxs token removed.
- Derived constant follows: TEXT_CAP_SCALE 16.5/12.5 → 16/12.5 (1.32 →
1.28; test pin 232.32px → 225.28px) — the plan-graph text cap now
tracks the snapped prose size.
Live: title 16px, Sessions/Background-agents labels 11px, composer 16px
with the 20px lh-input line box. Gates: typecheck, lint, 469/469.
Lane note: components/graph-context-marker.tsx (graph-stream file) had a
mechanical text-xxs → text-xs swap — required: the token removal
otherwise leaves a dead class in their file.
Titles were 14px (text-base); the user read them as still-small next to
the prose they open into. They now pull --lh-prose-size (16.5px) — the
same token lh-prose/lh-input render at, so the picker's titles and the
session's prose share one standard Source Sans 3 size (text-(length:…) —
the v4 var shorthand alone doesn't type-resolve). Meta stays 11px mono.
Live: title 16.5px vs meta 11px, row 54px. Gates: typecheck, lint, 469/469.
- lh-input: lh-prose's 1.5 reading leading made typing carets tower
(~25px box on 16.5px text, ~2.1× the glyphs — the caret fills the line
box in Chromium). Inputs are not paragraphs: 1.25 leading drops the
caret to ~21px, the font-metric floor (as close to the glyphs as
Chromium will draw). Swapped on every typing surface — composer
(chat + home), the thinking field, answer + editable-Other inputs, the
model search; rendered prose (message.tsx container, option
descriptions, chat.tsx pre-wrap) keeps lh-prose 1.5. Same family and
size as prose; only leading differs.
- Session titles: 14px (text-base) — Source Sans at 12.5px read as
small as the 11px mono meta under them; the title now holds its rank.
Live: title "Source Sans 3" 14px vs meta "JetBrains Mono" 11px, row
52px; composer line box 20.625px (was 24.75px).
Gates: typecheck, lint, 469/469.
- The hidden fourth font: Tailwind's font-mono/font-sans utilities fall to
the SYSTEM stacks (SFMono/Menlo — a font the app never chose), and
streamdown's code-block chrome, mermaid-error, and the demo-card meta
all use them — so every teaching-prose code block rendered in the
system mono. Fixed at the token level: @theme now aliases --font-mono →
JetBrains Mono and --font-sans → Source Sans 3, so every utility use
resolves to the app's three fonts (chrome=JetBrains, prose=Source Sans,
display=CMU bold).
- Session titles: Source Sans 3 (the human-words voice — the same font
the words were typed in; mono = machine data stays on the meta line).
One rule, finally applied to the picker too. CMU bold titles are the
queued experiment if this reads wrong live.
Gates: typecheck, lint, 469/469. Live: title "Source Sans 3" 12.5px,
meta "JetBrains Mono" 11px; code blocks now JetBrains.
Nothing exists purely for decoration: phase color-coding is retired
app-wide (phases only advance — every session ends Teaching — so
phase-as-signal was decoration with a one-time function), and what
state genuinely deserved — 'a turn is in flight' — is now carried by
MOTION alone, in the terminal's own glyph language.
- BrailleSpinner (components/braille-spinner.tsx): the canonical
cli-spinner sequence (⠋⠙⠹⠸⠼⠴⠦⠧⠇⠏) as exact dot bitmaps in a 2×4
braille cell, 80ms/frame (800ms cycle). Pure CSS: one shared keyframes,
frames staggered via animation-delay; no JS timer, no re-render per
frame — cheaper than the old breathing dot. Static contexts (SSR,
prefers-reduced-motion) show frame 0 — a legible glyph, not a blank.
- Sidebar rows: spinner ONLY while a teach turn is in flight; idle and
question-pending render NOTHING (a resting state has no scan value —
the meta line's 'Waiting for your answer' text carries it). The
three-state phase dot (pulse/solid/hollow) and PHASE_FILL/RING maps
are gone.
- Top bar PhaseChip: label-only pill; the old dot slot becomes the
spinner's home while a turn is in flight (busy prop wired from
ChatView's busy = localStream || turnInFlight). Transcript
PhaseDividers drop phase colors for monochrome rules + labels.
- API narrowing (app/api/chats/route.ts + ChatListItem contract):
busy = isTurnRunning ONLY — background jobs no longer count (the
sidebar's Background agents section is their channel; a per-row
spinner would double-signal them).
- globals.css: --phase-* tokens + lh-dot-breathe removed (dead after
the sweep — no remaining users).
Live-verified: idle/pending rows render no indicator, /chat/new chip is
label-only, 10 CSSAnimations at 800ms with correct 80ms stagger, static
frame 0 under reduced motion. Gates: typecheck, lint, 470/470, build.
Lane crossings to flag at merge: app/api/chats/route.ts + the
ChatListItem contract comment (src/core) — the busy-semantics narrowing;
components/chat.tsx one-line busy prop.
The old activity dock (fixed bottom-right, every view) was a cross-session
widget parked inside the session view — the same boundary confusion that
got the plan window moved. The sidebar is the app's cross-session surface,
so the agents section lives at its bottom strip now (user-locked design):
- ALWAYS present: empty means empty — the header ('Background agents',
matching the Sessions label language) sits alone; nothing hides and
nothing decorates (the total-cost span only renders when populated).
- Populates and grows when processes run: same blobs (sub-agents +
extraction runs, one poll, inferred cost, elapsed heartbeat), capped by
max-h-[40dvh] + internal scroll so a pile never crowds the session list.
- Per-blob END button (unchanged abort contract); the detail popover
becomes an INLINE expansion — the section scrolls, a floating popover
would clip at its bounds.
- Sidebar-native skin: border-t separator matching the sidebar's edge,
session-row hover language, no floating-card chrome.
- Sidebar closed = the learner opted out; no ambient signal for now
(user decision — invisibility until a clearer observability story).
- Narrow-mode count badge/drawer machinery retired with the dock.
app/layout.tsx: ActivityDock mount removed, ActivityProvider stays (the
sidebar consumes the context). Live-verified: populated rows with inline
detail + session link, abort makes the row vanish, idle renders the
header alone, closed sidebar hides the section with nothing floating.
Gates: typecheck, lint, 423/423 tests.
The sidebar button no longer POSTs a record (no more "Untitled session"
litter): it opens /chat/new, a sessionless draft view visually identical
to a fresh chat (same header + probe chip, the same ConversationEmptyState,
the same composer blob + stats dock). The session comes to exist only
when the learner sends the first message — and that message becomes its
title (startDraftSession: POST /api/chats {title: msg} → PUT the lifted
pre-chat settings → redirect /chat/<id>?prompt=<msg>, whose initialPrompt
path delivers the message as turn 1 — the home composer's proven contract).
- app/chat/new/page.tsx: the static draft route (static beats [id]).
- components/new-session.tsx: DraftShell (pure render seam) + NewSession
(router wiring); the model picker's empty-chatId branch defers its save
and lifts the selection, so pre-chat model/thinking rides the creation.
- components/sidebar.tsx: newSession is a plain router.push("/chat/new").
- tests/render-new-session.test.tsx: 6 pins — the create-on-send contract
(title = message, settings PUT, no-op on empty text) + the shell render.
Live-verified end to end: button → draft (0 creations), pre-chat Qwen
pick, send → exactly one session titled with the message, settings
persisted, redirect + turn 1 running. Gates 431/431.
- New session: literal '+' glyph removed — one lucide PlusIcon (the
duplicated glyph was PlusIcon + text '+').
- Top bar: a small pointer-events-none gradient under the header eases
the scroller into the bar exactly like the dock's bottom fade.
- Option subtext (opt.description): .lh-prose — Source Sans 3; 'I don't
know' copy stays JetBrains Mono.
- 'I don't know': now layout-matched with a radio circle; dashed border
preserved as the deliberate non-answer.
- Separator spacing: options group pb-1 → pb-2 so the gap before the
divider equals the 8px inter-option gap.
--text-xxs (10px) joins the ladder; every component-level text-[9|10|11px]
literal in owned components now pulls from the ladder (graph-view.tsx and
home.tsx untouched — graph stream). Cosmetic pins updated where touched.
- 'Learning Harness' wordmark → 'LH' (the owner's header in the mockup;
flagged as a copy change — it's visually the same brand mark).
- New session: + NEW SESSION row wired with one POST /api/chats then
navigate (the mock drew it as visual-only; POST already existed).
- Search: a SESSIONS label + inline input filtering the polled snapshot
client-side (title substring, no server round trip).
- Skin: sidebar stays bg-background with the edge #434343 border-r; the
selected row now carries the rounding + borders from the raised
surface #1C1C1C via accent tokens.
Redesign per review feedback: the colored phase strips were too busy —
removed. One small dot now carries two channels:
- COLOR = phase (sky/violet/emerald, same system as chip + dividers)
- FILL + MOTION = what's owed:
- pulsing = teacher is working (the only state that deserves motion)
- solid = a question awaits the learner's answer — the dominant
resting state of real sessions, so deliberately calm
- hollow = idle, nothing owed
The amber attention channel is gone entirely (it would read as a
phantom fourth phase). The meta line now leads with the useful fact:
"Waiting for your answer · 5m ago" / "Teacher is working…" — the
message count only shows when idle. Ordering stays pure recency.
- SessionRow (extracted, exported for tests): leftmost phase strip
(bookmark tick, per-phase color: probe/plan/teach) + status dot left of
the title — pulsing amber attention dot when an answer is owed, quiet
breathing dot while the teacher works, nothing when it's the learner's
turn. A pending answer outranks 'working'.
- globals.css: phase + attention color tokens (one system shared with the
upcoming header chip and dividers) and the two dot animations, both
disabled under prefers-reduced-motion.
- SessionsSidebar polls /api/chats every 2.5s while open (payload is tiny
now that busy/phase/pendingQuestion come from the list) and pauses while
the tab is hidden; fetch-on-navigation preserved.
The shell now imports through exactly two barrels, enforced by
import/no-restricted-paths (npm run lint):
components/** -> "@/src/core" (pure core API, browser-safe)
app/** -> "@/src/core" + "@/src/server" (server entries)
Zone violations are lint errors with architecture-pointer messages; the
pure-core modules (contracts, question-core, plan-tree, phases, pending,
math-delims, ui-message) may never import agent/server/store.
Supporting moves (direction: IO layers -> core):
- core/index.ts: the core public API barrel
- core/ui-message.ts: moved from src/agent (it was shell-facing all along)
- quiz/ask input zod schemas moved agent/tools -> core/question-core
(the question contract, alongside the grading logic)
- ChatRecord/ChatSummary moved store/chats -> core/contracts (single schema)
- GraphSnapshot/NodeStateClass moved core/graph -> core/contracts (the
/api/graph payload IS a contract; the pure renderer needs only these)
- src/server/{chats,graph,jobs}.ts + index.ts: thin server entries for the
transport layer; GET /api/graph's fold side-effect now lives behind
graphView() instead of inline in the route
Gates: tsc clean, 190/190 tests, eslint clean (law verified to fire on
store/agent/subpath violations), production build clean.
(Repo repair en route: a git object (app/chat/[id] tree) was missing from
the object store — reconstructed byte-exactly via mktree from its blob;
the broken node_modules that stalled the build was cleanly reinstalled.)
Sidebar (replaces the modal drawer):
- Inline, toggleable, no backdrop/focus theft — can stay open while working
- Open state persists across pages (provider in root layout) and reloads
(localStorage; starts closed server-side to avoid hydration mismatch,
stored value applied post-mount; default open on first run)
- Hamburger in page headers only when closed; close button in sidebar header
Floating composer blob (per reference screenshot):
- Floats over the transcript (absolute overlay), persists at bottom while
scrolling, content fades behind it (gradient mask); pb-44 scroll clearance
- Concentric corner radii: blob rounded-2xl(16px) − p-1.5(6px) = send
rounded-[10px] = 25% of the 40px button; CornerDownLeft icon per reference
- Stop moved from header into the blob (busy → square icon)
- prompt-input.tsx + 7 orphan ui files pruned (attachments/command palette
unused); hand-rolled Composer is ~100 lines and render-tested
Pending-question morph (one text field on screen, never two):
- Quiz/ask-select pending → blob becomes the note field (send hidden, hint
line above); card's internal note input removed; Submit consumes it
- Ask free-text pending → blob becomes the answer field; its send submits
via the card's registered submit api (ref bridge); Enter works
- Chat owns the single text state; card clears it on submit
- canSend for answer mode mirrors the card predicate directly — reading the
ref during render lagged one commit (found in browser testing)
Widths: one shared column (max-w-3xl + px-4) for transcript, cards, and
composer — all three measured pixel-identical (left 416, width 736).
Assistant Message max-w-full/MessageContent w-full (was max-w-[95%]/w-fit —
the 'cards are a bit shorter' bug).
User messages render plain text again — no math pipeline on learner-authored
text (currency hazard accepted for the model only, guarded by the prompt).
Tests: 58 pass (5 new composer pins; card tests updated to controlled
props). Verified live: note flow, answer flow, sidebar persistence, float,
fade, zero console errors — plus the live model spontaneously honoring the
$ currency escape contract in a continuation.
amosblomqvist