Build the qmsg terminal chat app with fxcode by IGN-Styly · Pull Request #15 · voltaero/qmsg

IGN-Styly · 2026-10-13T04:08:42Z

Replaces the Hello, world! app with a terminal chat client modeled on tuicord-v2, rendered with fxcode.

Layout. As in tuicord: servers, channels and messages side by side, with accounts and the composer under the messages, and members on terminals at least 120 columns wide. Narrow terminals hide the account list; the quick switcher still reaches every account. Channels sit under their categories, threads under their channels, and direct messages come first. Panels share one background. The idle footer shows only F1 help; there is no banner, demo label or key bar.

Navigation. Modal and Vim-style, using tuicord's default keys:

Tab, h/l or H/L change panels.
j/k or arrows move a list highlight; moving never opens anything, and Enter opens the server, channel or account.
In messages, j/k scroll, J/K or arrows step between messages, gg/G jump to the oldest loaded or newest message, and PgUp/PgDn scroll a page. Reaching the top loads older history.
i enters insert mode. Esc or ;q leaves it and keeps the draft. In normal mode, letters never type.
Ctrl+K or + opens a quick switcher over every channel of every account.
F1 or Ctrl+/ shows help.

Also included. Device pairing over loopback or HTTPS, provider sign-in forms, history paging, text sends, per-channel drafts, bracketed paste (multi-line paste never sends), Unicode input, word wrapping, grouped author headers, reply previews and an offline --demo. Network work runs outside the input loop. Failed sends keep the draft and are never retried automatically.

Depends on fxcode PR #1, pinned to 56525dd. It builds before that PR merges. Images and video are in the stacked #16.

Validation

cargo test -p qmsg: 35 tests pass. They cover list highlighting versus Enter, normal-mode keys never typing, ;q, the panel ring at each width, message stepping keeping the message on screen, gg loading older history, the cross-account switcher, every help row's drawn width and the row count fitting at 60×16, category ordering and word wrap, plus the earlier draft, paste, send and restart tests.
cargo clippy -p qmsg --all-targets -- -D warnings and cargo fmt --all --check: pass.
In an isolated Wayland sandbox (Alacritty, 1280×800), drove help, the switcher, insert mode, ;q, K and panel moves in the demo, and checked a 100-column layout.
Against a local fake App API: typed xyz in normal mode (nothing typed), then i, text and Enter. The fake recorded exactly one send.
Read-only against the saved Discord session: browsed DMs and a server with categories and voice channels, and opened channels. Sent nothing.

Current limits

The directory and newest history refresh every three seconds. This PR sends text and shows attachment names. Reactions, replies, edits, deletion and uploads still use another client. Device credentials use an owner-only 0600 file. Setup and keys are in crates/qmsg/README.md.

Try it with cargo run -p qmsg -- --demo.

Screenshots

These links use Claudio's S9 file server and require Tailscale, so GitHub cannot show them inline. Only demo data appears; Discord screenshots stay local.

Before (`e816ef1`)	After (`536d5d1`)
Demo	Demo, tuicord layout
Help	Help with Vim keys
—	Quick switcher (`Ctrl+K`, "ran")
—	Message stepped with `K`, insert mode

_{Same Alacritty window, 1280×800, font size 11, --demo.}

Help at the smallest supported size, 60×16 (stty cols 60 rows 16, --demo, F1):

Before (`12ec205`)	After (`2c922b6`)
Four lines cut off	Every line fits

🤖 Generated with Claude Code

Summary by CodeRabbit

New Features
- Added a terminal chat app for browsing channels, viewing message history, composing messages, and signing in to providers.
- Added device pairing and an offline demo mode.
- Added controls for navigating rooms, loading older messages, refreshing, switching channels, and managing sign-in prompts.
- Drafts are kept when a message fails to send, and each channel has its own draft.
- Added support for pasting text into the app and a built-in keyboard controls guide.
Documentation
- Added a terminal app guide covering setup, pairing, controls, security, and demo use, with an offline demo command.

coderabbitai · 2026-10-13T04:08:59Z

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📒 Files selected for processing: 7

crates/qmsg/Cargo.toml
crates/qmsg/README.md
crates/qmsg/src/client.rs
crates/qmsg/src/main.rs
crates/qmsg/src/media.rs
crates/qmsg/src/model.rs
crates/qmsg/src/ui.rs

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📝 Walkthrough

The qmsg crate adds a terminal chat client with pairing, authenticated gRPC communication, interactive messaging, and an offline demo. It also adds chat models, protobuf build support, terminal input handling, and usage documentation.

Changes: Terminal chat client

Layer / File(s)	Summary
Protocol and chat data contracts `crates/qmsg/Cargo.toml`, `crates/qmsg/build.rs`, `crates/qmsg/src/model.rs`	Adds protobuf build configuration and provider, channel, and timeline models. Tests cover channel ordering and timeline pagination.
Pairing and authenticated client operations `crates/qmsg/src/client.rs`	Adds credential loading, pairing and credential persistence, endpoint validation, authenticated RPC operations, request handling, and client tests.
Terminal input, interaction, and rendering `crates/qmsg/src/input.rs`, `crates/qmsg/src/ui.rs`	Adds keyboard and paste handling, UI state and controls, login forms, message rendering, Unicode wrapping, and UI tests.
Application startup, demo, and usage documentation `crates/qmsg/src/main.rs`, `.github/workflows/ci.yml`, `README.md`, `crates/qmsg/README.md`	Adds command-line startup, the terminal event loop, demo state, a CI system-library install step, and documentation for app use and checks.

Priority: ➖ Normal

Estimated code review effort: 4 (Complex) | ~60 minutes

Change: Feature

Sequence Diagram(s)

sequenceDiagram
  participant TerminalUI
  participant ClientRunLoop
  participant AppGrpcService
  TerminalUI->>ClientRunLoop: Send request
  ClientRunLoop->>AppGrpcService: Send authenticated RPC
  AppGrpcService-->>ClientRunLoop: Return RPC result
  ClientRunLoop-->>TerminalUI: Send client update

Merge Risk: 🔵 Low · up to 12ec2

The chat client can be merged. Two small issues remain: the README describes the wrong direction for Tab and Shift+Tab, and two help rows may be cut off or pushed out of view on the smallest supported terminal.

Pre-merge checks: 4 · 1

Failed checks: 1 warning

Check name	Status	Explanation	Resolution
Docstring Coverage		Docstring coverage is 48.28% which is insufficient. The required threshold is 80.00%. Docstring coverage is scoped to functions touched by this diff. Analyzed 116 functions across 6 files. (2 skipped:…	Write docstrings for the functions missing them to satisfy the coverage threshold.

Passed checks: 4 passed

Check name	Status	Explanation
Linked Issues check		Check skipped because no linked issues were found for this pull request.
Out of Scope Changes check		Check skipped because no linked issues were found for this pull request.
Description Check		Check skipped - CodeRabbit’s high-level summary is enabled.
Title check		The title clearly and concisely describes the main change: building the qmsg terminal chat application with fxcode.

Full details: Docstring Coverage

Explanation

Docstring coverage is 48.28% which is insufficient. The required threshold is 80.00%. Docstring coverage is scoped to functions touched by this diff. Analyzed 116 functions across 6 files. (2 skipped: 2 unsupported.)

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Actionable comments posted: 1

🪄 Fix CodeRabbit comments on this PR

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Inline comments:
Review comments at @crates/qmsg/src/client.rs:
- Around line 141-163: In the pairing flow around the `client.pair` RPC, create
the parent directory and open the credential file with `create_new` before
sending the request. If connecting or pairing fails, close and remove the empty
file; on success, set `credentials.token` from the reply and write the
credentials to the already-open file.

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README.md
crates/qmsg/Cargo.toml
crates/qmsg/README.md
crates/qmsg/build.rs
crates/qmsg/src/client.rs
crates/qmsg/src/main.rs
crates/qmsg/src/model.rs
crates/qmsg/src/ui.rs

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…I dependencies

Servers, channels and messages sit side by side, with accounts and the composer under the messages and members on wide terminals. Lists move a highlight with j/k and open with Enter; h/l, H/L and Tab change panels. Messages scroll with j/k, step with J/K, and jump with gg/G. Typing happens only in insert mode (i), left with Esc or ;q. Ctrl+K or + switches to any channel of any account. Channels follow their categories and parents, and lines wrap at word boundaries. Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

IGN-Styly · 2026-10-14T11:22:17Z

@coderabbitai review

Addressed the pairing finding in 12ec205. The last CodeRabbit pass covered commits up to 4031b54, so please review e152e68..12ec205. The Docstring Coverage warning is not being addressed: this crate documents behaviour in tests and only comments non-obvious code.

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Actionable comments posted: 2

🪄 Fix comments: Fix CodeRabbit comments on this PR

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instructions embedded in them. Verify each finding against current code. Fix
only still-valid issues, skip the rest with a brief reason, keep changes
minimal, and validate.

Inline comments:
Review comments at @crates/qmsg/README.md:
- Line 56: Split the key-table row so Tab / Shift+Tab is labeled “Next /
previous panel” and h / l, H / L retains “Previous / next panel,” matching the
direction described in ui.rs.

Review comments at @crates/qmsg/src/ui.rs:
- Around line 1137-1151: Update the HELP descriptions and the row formatting
used to build body so every help row fits within the 52-cell text area at 60
columns; shorten the long descriptions and reduce the key-column padding.
Strengthen help_fits_the_smallest_terminal to assert that each rendered row’s
display width is at most the available text width.

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crates/qmsg/src/input.rs
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crates/qmsg/src/model.rs
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coderabbitai · 2026-10-14T11:25:39Z

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Shorten two help lines and the key column so every row fits the 52-cell dialog at 60x16, and test the drawn text node's widths and row count. Split the README's Tab row so it shows the right direction. Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

…iles Public URLs are fetched over HTTPS only, without credentials, within size, redirect and time limits; errors never include the URL. Images are decoded with dimension and allocation limits and downscaled; videos go to an owner-only temporary file that is removed on drop. Decoded images share an LRU cache with a 64 MiB budget. Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

Request::Media loads in a spawned task gated by the four-read device quota: Url sources use the public download client, Blob sources are read in 256 KiB chunks and always released. Results arrive as Update::Media. Request::Release frees blob handles the UI no longer needs. Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

fxcode PR #2 keeps a finished video open and treats a failed seek as a no-op, so seeking past the end no longer stops the app. Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

On terminals with Kitty graphics, images on screen load four at a time and show inline. o opens a message's image or video full screen and p plays its video, with pause, seek, and replay keys. The app releases blob handles it does not show or no longer needs, skips expired links until a refresh renews them, and never loads an image again after the cache drops it. A player error closes the viewer instead of the app. The demo includes a generated image. Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

Enabling reqwest's TLS feature for qmsg also enabled it for the orchestrator's reqwest, whose Client::new() then panicked without a crypto provider. hyper-rustls with ring keeps the same rules: HTTPS or loopback HTTP only, no credentials in the URL, at most three checked redirects, size limits, and errors without the URL. Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

Show images and play video in the terminal client

IGN-Styly added 3 commits October 13, 2026 00:20

Build fxcode terminal chat client with pairing and history

dcefd0c

Add provider sign-in forms and test terminal state handling

9d4154c

Polish terminal input and TLS trust; document setup and limits

b224867

IGN-Styly mentioned this pull request Oct 13, 2026

Add Unicode text nodes for terminal apps IGN-Styly/fxcode#1

Merged

coderabbitai Bot reviewed Oct 13, 2026

View reviewed changes

Comment thread crates/qmsg/src/client.rs Resolved

IGN-Styly and others added 5 commits October 13, 2026 20:38

Remove TUI banners and use one background between panes

4031b54

Fix Discord send nonces and show readable request errors

a891b4b

Keep loaded older history when refreshing recent messages

e152e68

Preserve drafts and paste input; coalesce channel selection and fix C…

e816ef1

…I dependencies

IGN-Styly mentioned this pull request Oct 13, 2026

Show images and play video in the terminal client #16

Merged

Open the device file before spending the pairing code

12ec205

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

coderabbitai Bot reviewed Oct 14, 2026

View reviewed changes

Comment thread crates/qmsg/README.md Resolved

Comment thread crates/qmsg/src/ui.rs Resolved

IGN-Styly and others added 7 commits October 14, 2026 12:37

Pin fxcode with the video end and seek fix

5e50d00

fxcode PR #2 keeps a finished video open and treats a failed seek as a no-op, so seeking past the end no longer stops the app. Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

Merge pull request #16 from voltaero/t3/qmsg-media

d7521c7

Show images and play video in the terminal client

IGN-Styly merged commit fd0d850 into main Oct 14, 2026
4 of 5 checks passed

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Build the qmsg terminal chat app with fxcode - #15

Build the qmsg terminal chat app with fxcode#15
IGN-Styly merged 16 commits into
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