# Memory — durable lessons, learned the hard way

Curated, not append-only: one line per fact, newest at the top of its
section; delete entries that stop being true. Details usually live in a
docs/ROADMAP.md decision record — pointer given as (§ item). Add a fact
here the moment a debugging session teaches you something a future
iteration would otherwise rediscover.

## Testing & VM recipes
- **theme-shot softGL cannot start Ghostty** — `btop.png` is best-effort
  (usually identical to desktop). Guest asserts on
  `~/.config/btop/themes/nomarchy.theme` prove baking; the TUI look is
  hardware/GL tier (HARDWARE-QUEUE).
- **Waybar `custom/doctor` tripwire:** status helper must invoke
  `nomarchy-doctor` by **absolute store path** (waybar's env can miss
  system PATH → `command -v … || exit 0` self-hides forever); empty
  `"text"` also self-hides; strip ANSI before packing the tooltip; use
  signal 10 + `format = "{}"`. theme-shot asserts class:bad + glyph and
  pokes RTMIN+10 before the desktop shot.
- **tuigreet dies silently under runNixOSTest** (even bare, no theme
  flag: greetd sits as "(greetd)" with no child, nothing in the
  journal — its stderr goes to the VT) — nixpkgs' own greetd test uses
  agreety instead. Greeter *rendering* is interactive-ISO/hardware
  tier; don't burn another session on a checks.greeter VM test.
- In VM tests `pgrep -f PATTERN` can match the test backdoor's own
  `bash -c` wrapper (the pattern is in its cmdline) — use `pgrep -x`
  or a `[t]uigreet`-style bracket pattern.
- A checks.* fixture CANNOT be a writeText/toFile state file read at
  eval time ("path … is not valid" — flake check's eval store won't
  realise it): extract the logic into a pure importable file and
  unit-test THAT (monitor-rules.nix / checks.display-profiles is the
  pattern).
- CI (`.gitea/workflows/check.yml`) is **eval-tier only**: the act_runner
  is a docker container (no systemd, no /dev/kvm). Container gotchas are
  documented in the workflow header (single-user Nix + nixbld users,
  `sandbox=false` for Stylix IFD, Nix pinned 2.31.5 vs lazy-trees, no JS
  actions past node20) — learned over the legacy repo's 57 runs; read
  them before touching the workflow.
- The Gitea instance is **1.25.4** — `on: schedule` workflows are
  supported; bump.yml assumes the Actions token can push to `main`
  (standard Gitea behaviour, but unconfirmed until the first run lands).
- The git server is **Gitea** (gitea/act_runner via docker-compose), NOT
  Forgejo — workflows are read from `.gitea/workflows/` (or `.github/`),
  never `.forgejo/workflows/` (a whole push cycle was lost to that).
- Reusable headless VM harness: `checks.*` via runNixOSTest — existing
  examples to crib from: `distro-id` (boots + `switch-to-configuration
  dry-activate`), `hardware-toggles` (kernel cmdline/PAM assertions),
  `battery-charge-limit` (fake Mains adapter via `test_power`, real udev
  uevent, `InvocationID` change proves the restart).
- Themed-desktop screenshots work headlessly: software-GL Hyprland
  (`LIBGL_ALWAYS_SOFTWARE` on virtio-gpu) + `machine.screenshot()` QMP
  dump — prototyped 2026-06-19, kept as the fallback for theme previews
  (§ Visual theme picker).
- Hyprland/Ghostty need guest GL (`virtio-vga-gl`, `gl=on`) in
  interactive QEMU or the session won't start; black screen ≈ missing GL
  (docs/TESTING.md § gotchas).
- No KVM = slow, not broken; don't read slowness as failure.

## Known-broken / watchlist
- **btrfs-assistant "segfault" was unprivileged-only** (re-diagnosed
  2026-07-04): libbtrfsutil's unprivileged subvolume iteration crashes on
  btrfs-progs 6.17.1 (upstream-fixed after); **as root it works**, and the
  pkexec launcher runs it as root. The real distro bug was **no polkit
  agent in the session** (every pkexec failed silently) — hyprpolkitagent
  now ships (hyprland.nix exec-once). `checks.snapshot-gui` guards the
  root path. Lesson: before "app X is broken", check WHO it runs as — and
  whether polkit prompts can render at all (§ Snapshot browse/restore).
- **NixOS release bump is a trap:** the discarded attempt
  (branch deleted 2026-06-22) hit a Hyprland OOM blocker; a redo is a
  deliberate `v2`, never part of routine lock bumps.
- `theme-state.json` is git-tracked inside an 86 MB flake tree, so every
  state write re-copies the source before eval — the wallpapers-artifact
  split (BACKLOG LATER) is the decided fix (§ Faster switches).
- **Friendly theme-state load** (`modules/theme-state-read.nix`, #66):
  `builtins.tryEval` does **not** catch `readFile`/`fromJSON` failures —
  gate with `pathExists` + empty/non-object checks before `fromJSON`.
  Subtle JSON syntax errors still surface from nlohmann (line/col);
  field schema stays in `theme.nix`. mkFlake must `builtins.seq` the
  check onto the whole return set or lazy attr access skips it.

## Design invariants
- **Waybar status is never color-only** (item 28 sweep, iteration #69):
  every status module must distinguish its states by SHAPE (glyph) or
  presence (self-hide), never color alone — good/warn/bad collapse under
  color-blindness. When adding a state, give it a distinct glyph or gate
  the module on it; a new `class` that only recolors an existing glyph is
  a regression. Suppressed notification states (DND *and* app-inhibited)
  all use the bell-off glyph + @muted.
- **Identity themes are not traffic lights** (#69): white, vantablack,
  lumon, hackerman, matte-black, miasma — monochrome / mono-hue / earthy
  status by design. `audit-theme-design.py` tags their hue/CVD/ANSI-family
  findings `[identity]`; do not "fix" them into R/Y/G.
- **Import hierarchy ≠ ANSI** (#70): `import-palettes.py` must not set
  surface==overlay when color0==color8; light color0 is often ANSI black
  (not a chip). Roles are first-class — never bulk-reimport shipped JSON
  without a hierarchy pass.

## Gotchas (cost a debugging session once)
- Waybar `layer: top` renders above **even real-fullscreen windows** — the
  bar draws over a fullscreen video. `layer: bottom` lets the fullscreen
  surface cover it while the exclusive zone still reserves the bar's space
  in normal tiling (trade-off: floating windows can now overlap the bar
  strip). Set in both waybar.nix and every whole-swap jsonc (item 30).
- Hyprland binds match the exact modmask: a shifted keysym (`question`)
  needs SHIFT in `mods` or the bind never fires — the keypress falls
  through to the focused window (§ item 26; caught on hardware, invisible
  to eval-tier tests).
- Never kill a Wayland session-lock client (hyprlock): its crash
  failsafe drops to a tty instead of unlocking (§ Hibernate
  double-unlock).
- rofi `element-icon size` is one value = a square cell; `WxH` silently
  collapses and non-square icons letterbox — pre-crop images square at
  build (§ Visual theme picker).
- WirePlumber 0.5 monitor rules can only early-match `device.api`;
  `device.product.name` etc. bind *after* the rule runs — surgical
  libcamera scoping is impossible (§ Webcam).
- `hyprctl switchxkblayout` is a *global* layout flip; per-device isolation
  needs `device[<name>]:kb_layout` keywords (§ Keyboard layouts).
- Waybar's clock captures the timezone at construction — a zone change
  needs SIGUSR2 (watcher in `timezone.nix`) (§ Automatic timezone).
- Waybar `persistent_workspaces` (underscore) is dead syntax silently
  ignored; the hyphen form is honoured and renders phantom workspaces
  (§ Waybar shows non-existent workspaces).
- GTK4/libadwaita/Qt6 read light/dark from the portal's
  `org.freedesktop.appearance color-scheme` (dconf), not Stylix polarity
  (§ GTK/Qt ignore the theme's mode).
- Update order matters downstream: `sys-update` (lock) before
  `home-update`, or desktop changes are silently skipped against the old
  lock (README § 3).
- Hyprland 0.53 rewrote window rules: `windowrulev2` is a hard error and
  the old rule-first `float, class:^…$` no longer parses — both surface a
  red config-error banner on the default desktop. Hyprlang legacy form is
  now `<effect> <value>, match:<prop> ^…$` (e.g. `float 1, match:class ^…$`);
  effects carry a value, matchers take `match:` (§ windowrule migration).
- grub `loadfont`s every `.pf2` in a theme dir — reuse a bundled DejaVu
  rather than shipping fonts (§ Distro branding).
- `.claude/skills/*/SKILL.md` are now **tracked** (the `.gitignore`
  `.claude/skills/` line was un-commented→removed, 7d52d4b) — commit skill
  edits like any repo doc. Still never `git add -A` blindly: check
  `git status --short` for genuine strangers first (`settings.local.json`,
  harness-dropped files) and commit with explicit pathspecs (§ loop hygiene).
