The lazy startup panel could remain stuck on the placeholder when no first
prompt was submitted because agent construction only started from _sess(). Keep
session.create cheap, but schedule _start_agent_build shortly after returning
the placeholder so tools/skills hydrate automatically.
Also replace the ugly placeholder bar rows with compact unicode-animations
braille loaders for the tools and skills sections.
Tests:
- python -m py_compile tui_gateway/server.py
- cd ui-tui && npm run type-check && npm run build
- cd ui-tui && npm test -- --run src/__tests__/useSessionLifecycle.test.ts src/__tests__/useConfigSync.test.ts
- scripts/run_tests.sh tests/tui_gateway/test_protocol.py::test_sess_found tests/tools/test_code_execution_modes.py tests/tools/test_code_execution.py
Match classic CLI perceived startup behavior: show the TUI shell and composer
before constructing the full AIAgent. session.create now returns a lightweight
placeholder session with lazy=true and no longer starts _make_agent eagerly.
The first method that needs the agent triggers _start_agent_build() via _sess();
prompt.submit is routed through the RPC worker pool so that the initial wait for
agent construction does not block the stdio dispatcher.
The intro panel renders skeleton rows for tools/skills while the real
session.info payload is absent, then hydrates to the real tools/skills panel once
AIAgent initialization completes. Also skip the startup /voice status probe and
avoid the input.detect_drop RPC for ordinary plain-text prompts to keep early
startup/first-submit paths cheap.
Measurements on macOS Terminal.app:
- Previous full ready p50 after earlier PR commits: ~1537ms
- Lazy skeleton panel p50: ~794ms
- Original baseline full ready p50: ~1843ms
So the visible startup surface is now ~743ms faster than the prior PR state and
~1.05s faster than the original baseline. First prompt still pays the same agent
construction cost if it races the background/skeleton state, matching classic
CLI's deferred behavior.
Tests:
- python -m py_compile tui_gateway/server.py
- cd ui-tui && npm run type-check && npm run build
- scripts/run_tests.sh tests/tui_gateway/test_protocol.py::test_sess_found tests/tools/test_code_execution_modes.py tests/tools/test_code_execution.py
- cd ui-tui && npm test -- --run src/__tests__/useSessionLifecycle.test.ts src/__tests__/useConfigSync.test.ts
This PR groups the TUI fixes that restore macOS Terminal usability and clean up the theme/composer regressions:
- copy transcript selections on macOS drag-release so Terminal.app users can copy while mouse tracking is enabled
- copy composer selections on macOS drag-release; composer selection is internal to TextInput and does not use the global Ink selection bus
- keep IDE Cmd+C forwarding setup macOS-only, and make keybinding conflict checks respect simple when-clause overlap/negation
- force truecolor before chalk initializes (unless NO_COLOR / FORCE_COLOR / HERMES_TUI_TRUECOLOR opt-outs apply) so the default banner keeps its gold/amber/bronze gradient in Terminal.app
- move TUI surfaces onto semantic theme tokens and preserve skin prompt symbols as bare tokens with renderer-owned spacing
- render focused placeholders as dim hint text in TTY mode instead of inverse/selected-looking synthetic cursor text
- branding.tsx: `color="yellow"` → `t.color.warn` so light-mode users get the
burnt-orange warn instead of unreadable bright yellow on white bg.
- theme.ts: replace HERMES_TUI_LIGHT regex with `detectLightMode(env)` that also
sniffs `COLORFGBG` (XFCE Terminal, rxvt, Terminal.app, iTerm2). Bg slot 7 or
15 → LIGHT_THEME. Explicit HERMES_TUI_LIGHT (on *or* off) still wins.
- tests: cover empty env, explicit on/off, COLORFGBG positions, and off-override.
The status bar was showing stale lifecycle text ("running…") while the
face+verb stream flickered through the thinking panel as Python pushed
thinking.delta events. That's backwards — the face ticker is the
primary "I'm alive" signal, it belongs in the status bar; the thinking
panel is for substantive reasoning and tool activity.
Status bar now reads `ui.busy`: when true, renders a local `<FaceTicker>`
cycling FACES × VERBS on a 2.5s interval, unaffected by server events.
When false, the bar shows the actual status string (ready, starting
agent…, interrupted, etc.).
Side effect: `scheduleThinkingStatus` still patches `ui.status` with
Python's face text, but while busy the bar ignores that string and uses
the ticker instead. No server-side changes needed — Python keeps
emitting thinking.delta as a liveness heartbeat, the TUI just doesn't
let it fight the status bar.
