feat(sse): heal a stalled SSE stream with a heartbeat + client watchdog

An EventSource that stops delivering does not always error. A proxy that
idle-closed the connection, a laptop resumed from sleep, a tailnet reconnect:
`onerror` never fires, the header dot stays green, and every SSE-driven surface
(tab status dots, sessions created on another device, renames) freezes until the
user reloads. Nothing on the client tracked stream liveness at all.

The server already wrote a keepalive every 15s, but as an SSE `:keepalive`
COMMENT, and comments are invisible to `EventSource` by spec, so there was
nothing a client could observe.

Server:
- `sse:heartbeat` under a new Transport category in the event registry
  (155 constants now, both counts updated).
- `cleanupDeadClients()` writes that named frame (`{"t":<epoch ms>}`) instead of
  the comment. Interval, tunnel padding and dead-socket eviction are unchanged.
  The write stays per-client rather than going through `broadcast()`: the frame
  carries no session data, so it needs no multi-user owner routing.

Client:
- `computeSseStale()` in constants.js, a pure policy beside
  `computeConnectionLossUi`. Stale only when the transport believes it is
  `connected`, the device is online, and no frame has arrived for 45s (three
  missed heartbeats). The `connected`-only guard is also the loop breaker: a
  forced reconnect leaves that state immediately, so the watchdog cannot re-fire
  while one is in flight.
- The liveness stamp is applied inside `addListener` itself, so the
  `_SSE_HANDLER_MAP` wrappers and the directly-registered listeners all feed it
  from one place instead of three that can drift. The heartbeat's own listener
  is a no-op that exists only to be registered, since `EventSource` drops named
  events nobody listens for.
- A 5s watchdog forces `connectSSE()` when the policy says stale, and is cleared
  at the top of `connectSSE()` and nowhere else (its only teardown path).
  Recovery needs no new sync path: the reconnect re-runs `handleInit`, which
  already rebuilds from the server. `visibilitychange` -> visible checks too,
  riding the existing listener, since a background tab's timers are throttled
  and a wake is exactly when a stream comes back zombie.
- The forced reconnect logs one diagnostic line: if a middlebox ever strips or
  delays heartbeats, the failure mode is "silently reconnects every 45s", which
  is undebuggable from a field report without it.

Tests: `test/sse-staleness.test.ts` (node VM over constants.js, threshold
boundaries and every not-stale guard) and `test/sse-heartbeat.test.ts` (drives
`cleanupDeadClients()` with fake replies: named frame not a comment, parseable
payload, padding only with a tunnel, dead clients still evicted).

Verified end to end on an isolated instance: with the stream closed client-side
(no `onerror`), a rename sticks, an out-of-band session stays invisible, then
the watchdog reconnects on its own and it appears without a reload.

Event names are part of the stable API contract, so this is a MINOR bump.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>
This commit is contained in:
Codeman maintainer
2026-08-13 17:28:35 +02:00
parent d19895651d
commit c790166564
8 changed files with 434 additions and 11 deletions
+3 -1
View File
@@ -292,6 +292,8 @@ Frontend JS modules have `@fileoverview` with `@dependency`/`@loadorder` tags. L
**Connection-loss UI** (`computeConnectionLossUi()` in constants.js, writer `_updateConnectionLossUi()` in app.js): the service worker serves the cached app shell, so an unreachable server (phone off the tailnet, VPN down, server stopped) used to render a normal-looking empty dashboard whose only tell was the 8px header dot, which reads as "no sessions", not "no connection". Two surfaces now: a full-screen **overlay** while no server state has loaded this page load (nothing behind it is worth preserving), and a non-blocking **banner** once it has (the terminal scrollback stays readable). ⚠️ A **2.5s grace** is load-bearing: a COM deploy restarts the server and SSE is back in ~200ms, and a banner on every deploy trains the user to ignore it. `navigator.onLine === false` skips the grace, since that is never a blip. Retry re-arms SSE **and** the terminal WS (`planWsReconnect` can 'give-up', and the SSE backoff caps at 30s).
**SSE staleness watchdog** (`computeSseStale()` in constants.js, `_checkSseStale()` + a 5s interval in app.js): an `EventSource` that stops delivering does not always error, so `onerror` never fires, the header dot stays green, and every SSE-driven surface (tab status dots, sessions created on another device, renames) freezes until the user reloads. ⚠️ The 15s server keepalive was an SSE **comment** (`:keepalive`), and comments are **invisible to `EventSource` by spec**, so there was nothing a client could observe: it is now the named `sse:heartbeat` event (`cleanupDeadClients()`, sse-stream-manager.ts), which is exactly why the frame had to change type. ⚠️ Staleness is judged **only while the status is `connected`** and the device is online; that guard is the loop breaker, since a forced `connectSSE()` leaves `connected` immediately and cannot re-fire while a reconnect is in flight. ⚠️ The liveness stamp is applied inside `addListener` itself, so every registered handler (the `_SSE_HANDLER_MAP` wrappers AND the directly-registered ones) feeds it from one place; the heartbeat's own listener is a no-op that exists **only** to be registered, since `EventSource` drops named events nobody listens for. ⚠️ The watchdog interval is cleared at the top of `connectSSE()` and nowhere else (its only teardown path); clearing it elsewhere stacks intervals. Recovery needs no new sync path: the reconnect re-runs `handleInit` → `_resetAllAppState()`. The forced reconnect logs one diagnostic line, because a middlebox that strips heartbeats presents as "silently reconnects every 45s".
**Z-index layers**: subagent windows (1000), plan agents (1100), mobile/tablet fixed header (1200, `mobile.css`), modals on ≤768px (1300 — must beat the fixed header or the modal close button is buried), log viewers (2000), connection-loss overlay (2500, above the fixed header and modals), image popups (3000), local echo overlay (7).
**Respawn presets**: `solo-work` (3s/60min), `subagent-workflow` (45s/240min), `team-lead` (90s/480min), `ralph-todo` (8s/480min), `overnight-autonomous` (10s/480min).
@@ -320,7 +322,7 @@ Frontend JS modules have `@fileoverview` with `@dependency`/`@loadorder` tags. L
### SSE Event Registry
154 event constants in `src/web/sse-events.ts` (backend) and `SSE_EVENTS` in `constants.js` (frontend). **Both must be kept in sync**, and `test/sse-registry-parity.test.ts` is the guard that pins it (currently exactly in sync, 154 = 154, no drift either direction). The backend file's `@fileoverview` carries the per-category breakdown.
155 event constants in `src/web/sse-events.ts` (backend) and `SSE_EVENTS` in `constants.js` (frontend). **Both must be kept in sync**, and `test/sse-registry-parity.test.ts` is the guard that pins it (currently exactly in sync, 155 = 155, no drift either direction). The backend file's `@fileoverview` carries the per-category breakdown.
### API Routes