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mesh-catalog/modules/dunst/README.md
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jochen d83711f11e
mesh/merge-gate pass: builds dunst, messenger → g14, novox, shanks; no bus step; every machine composes with the change as it did without (4 of 4 compose)
mesh/repo-check pass: its merge-check.sh passed
mesh/delivery-group group fix/notifications-after-review ready: every member ready, and composed together they pass
mesh/delivery superseded: a newer head of the same pull request
Take only acknowledgements from a desk click, and make each answer a one-time ticket
Review found that any process of the operator's account can choose a dunst action,
so a click could release or stop a delivery in the operator's name; that tokens
lived for ever; that a warning's answers died in ten seconds; and that a restarted
notifier left dead buttons (hq ADR 0258).
2026-10-08 14:38:24 +02:00

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4.2 KiB
Markdown

# dunst
The notifier as a module (novox/hq ADR 0208, research 026/05).
- Installs `dunst`, and `libnotify` for `notify-send`, the client every program and these tools use.
- Claims the mesh's `node-notifier` seat and serves its verbs `send` and `history`.
- Owns `~/.config/dunst/dunstrc` and the directory `~/.config/dunst/dunstrc.d/`. Another module's
rule is that module's own file in the directory (ADR 0208 §4). dunst reads the directory after
`dunstrc`, so a drop-in outranks it.
- **Starts nothing.** The package registers dunst with D-Bus, which starts it on the first
notification, inside the account's service manager. There is no autostart line, no unit and no
session-start contribution.
- **Requires no display of its own.** dunst speaks both X11 and Wayland and picks the one the session
has, so it serves an X session and a later sway one alike.
## Answers from a notification
`send` with `actions` runs `notify-send --wait` with one `--action` per answer, answers the id at once and
waits in this bundle for the operator's choice (dunst offers the actions on a middle click, or in its
context menu). The token chosen is said as this module's event `action-chosen`; it becomes the
node-notifier seat's event once seats publish events of their own (novox/hq to-be 46 phase 3). Nothing
is said for a notification closed, expired or replaced without an answer, and a wait ends after seven
days. A notification that offers answers stays until dismissed (`expire_ms` 0). A restart of this bundle
ends the waits it held; it says `started` {machine} once it serves, and the operator channel shows the
open answers there again (novox/hq ADR 0258). `notify-send` prints the id before it waits, also into a
pipe (checked on the laptop on 2026-10-08: the id at once, and "Wait timeout expired" when it expired).
## Tools
Every tool goes over the account's session bus. None needs the screen, and each answers clearly when
the account is not logged in.
| tool | does |
|---|---|
| `node-notifier.send` | a notification: title, body, urgency, sender, icon, how long, and the answers it offers (`actions`: token and label); answers its id, and says the chosen answer later as the event `action-chosen` {id, token, machine} |
| `node-notifier.history` | what was shown, newest first, with how long ago |
| `dunst_pause` / `dunst_resume` | do not disturb: notifications are held back, not lost |
| `dunst_close_all` | clear the screen; the history keeps them |
| `dunst_rules` | the rules the running notifier holds, and the files they come from |
| `dunst_count` | shown, waiting, in history, and whether paused |
## What it chose, and what it improves
The workstations' files differed: one had the notifications bottom-right, 15 % transparent and with
rounded corners; the other top-right, opaque and square. This module takes the second, because the
rest of the desktop is square and opaque, and the top-right corner sits under the bar that shows the
count. The file keeps only the settings that differ from dunst's defaults.
- **The context menu works.** It called `/usr/bin/dmenu`, installed on neither machine. It now calls
`dmenu`, the seat command of whichever module holds `node-launcher` (`rofi` on the workstations).
- **The face is the interface one,** Inter (research 026/04), instead of a monospace Nerd font.
- `icon_path`, which named two directories of an icon theme that is not installed, is gone. The icon
theme is looked up recursively.
## What it leaves as found
- `~/.config/dunst/dunstrc.d/50-slack.conf`, the Slack rule. It becomes the Slack module's own drop-in
when there is one, and until then it is the operator's file in a directory this module owns.
## Migration (ADR 0182)
- The first push keeps the found `dunstrc` once, then writes the module's.
- **The desktop runs two notification daemons** because its session began before the session bus
fix (research 026/01). That ends at the next login, and nothing here starts a second one.
`dunst_count` after logging in again shows the one daemon's counts.
## Blockers
- `node-notifier` is ADR 0208's seat. Until the controller knows it, `mctl` reads the claim as
unknown.
- `dunst_rules` and the counts ask the running notifier. When none runs, the bus starts one, which
needs a session to draw on.