Session experience parity: make real Claude threads feel alive (spec + checklist)

[flazouh]

Master tracking issue for the post-migration session experience. The engine round trip works (real replies, persistence, restart survival) but the THREAD EXPERIENCE is not at parity with the Tauri app. Owner-reported on 2026-08-26: no connection indicator, duplicated message rows, no streaming animation, tool calls invisible.

Spec (target behavior)

A real Claude session in the Electrobun app must:

1. Show CONNECTION state in the panel header: connecting -> connected -> (error w/ retry) as the adapter session opens; indicator visible within 2s of opening a thread.
2. Render each user message EXACTLY ONCE, immediately on send (optimistic), reconciled seamlessly when the canonical row lands (no flicker, no double).
3. Stream assistant text incrementally as TokenAppended events arrive (sub-second cadence), with the streaming affordances (working spark on the session row + shimmer/cursor in the transcript) active during awaiting_model/streaming and cleared on turn completion.
4. Render tool calls as they happen: tool-call rows with title/status (in_progress -> completed/failed) interleaved at the right transcript position, matching the tracer/fixture experience already proven in the scaffold (Send a message in a real session and see the reply stream #241 evidence).
5. Surface approvals (permission requests) as actionable rows; approve/deny flows through to the adapter (bridge respondToPermission).

Checklist

• QA characterization with per-layer evidence (in flight)
• Connection indicator wired to the orchestration/adapter readiness (ticket after QA)
• Duplicate-row reconciliation (optimistic vs canonical dedupe) (ticket after QA)
• Token streaming into the live transcript + streaming affordances (ticket after QA)
• Tool-call rows end to end: adapter facts -> events -> projections -> transcript mapper (known gap: transcript-viewport-rows-from-entries.ts deliberately omits tool/operation rows; projector lacks operations/turn-detail carriage — see orchestration-canonical-bridge.ts header)
• Approvals actionable in the real UI
• Re-QA the full matrix on one build after fixes

Known constraints

• Single-worktree workflow: fixes land sequentially in the main checkout (owner directive 2026-08-26).
• Another session actively develops on the same branch (color field, zoom, submit-intent) — coordinate, never ship its uncommitted work.
• Terminal drawer wiring is paused on branch fix/terminal-drawer-wiring pending owner decision.

[flazouh]

QA characterization complete — all four defects layered with evidence. Tickets: #263 (tool calls, server half IN FLIGHT), #264 (streaming affordances + optimistic dedupe), #265 (connection indicator — the old 'no icon when connected' design is overruled by the owner), #266 (QA-found: SESSION_NOT_FOUND refresh loop, duplicate-workspace_root crash). Desktop-side fixes queue behind the concurrent session's in-progress edits to the same files; server half runs now.

[flazouh]

Final re-QA on build 63d62fc: 4/5 spec behaviors PASS with hard evidence — connection dot transitions across turns, exactly one user row throughout, real streaming (2→1122 char monotonic curve, spark present during and gone after), tool calls fully live (Bash + Read rows with shimmer transitions, post-tool text rendering with no stall). One remaining fail: after restart the sidebar lists the same session TWICE (projection-union identity vs disk-scan identity, likely an alias pair), and the orchestration-id duplicate opens a broken panel. Fix in flight; auto-restore of the open panel works correctly regardless. Also noted: cold-reload sidebar unmount until the discovery screen runs once (hot_cache never rewritten) — follow-up candidate.

[flazouh]

ALL FIVE spec behaviors now pass. The last fail (duplicate sidebar identities after restart) is fixed end to end: the provider_session fact now projects (migration 0022 + the contractKind discriminator fix), the contract exposes providerSessionId, and the startup merge upgrades the union row to the openable disk identity in place (scan-side alias dedupe). Final live gate: ONE sidebar row after restart, opens with full history. Tickets #263-#266 closed. Remaining follow-ups tracked separately: cold-reload sidebar unmount until discovery runs once; provider-usage title-merge lock; OpenCode tool paths; terminal drawer wiring (paused on its branch).