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Developer Guide for Notedeck Chrome

This guide covers the technical details of the Notedeck Chrome component, which serves as the container and navigation framework for the Notedeck Nostr browser.

Project Structure

notedeck_chrome
├── Cargo.toml          - Project manifest and dependencies
├── android/            - Android-specific code and configuration
│   └── ...
└── src/
    ├── notedeck.rs     - Main application entry point
    ├── lib.rs          - Library exports
    ├── theme.rs        - Theme definitions and customization
    ├── preview.rs      - UI component preview system
    ├── chrome.rs       - Core Chrome UI implementation
    ├── fonts.rs        - Font loading and configuration
    ├── app.rs          - Application management
    ├── android.rs      - Android-specific code
    └── setup.rs        - Application setup and configuration

Key Components

Chrome

The Chrome struct (src/chrome.rs) is the main container that:

  • Maintains a list of applications
  • Renders the sidebar
  • Handles application switching
  • Processes UI actions

NotedeckApp

The NotedeckApp enum (src/app.rs) represents different applications that can be managed by the Chrome:

  • Columns - The main Damus columns interface
  • Dave - The Dave application
  • Other - Generic container for other implementations of the App trait

Setup

The setup.rs file handles initialization of:

  • Font loading
  • Theme setup
  • Window configuration
  • App icons

Architecture Overview

Notedeck Chrome follows a container-based architecture:

  1. The Chrome struct maintains a vector of applications
  2. It controls which application is active via an index
  3. The sidebar is rendered with buttons for each application
  4. When an application is selected, it's updated within the container

Android Support

Android integration relies on:

  • Native Android UI integration via GameActivity
  • Custom keyboard height detection for improved mobile UX
  • Configuration via external JSON files

Android Keyboard Handling

The Android integration includes custom Java code to handle keyboard visibility changes:

  • KeyboardHeightProvider - Detects keyboard height changes
  • KeyboardHeightObserver - Interface for keyboard events
  • MainActivity - Main Android activity with JNI integration

Styling and Theming

The theme system supports:

  • Light and dark mode
  • OLED-optimized dark mode for mobile
  • Customizable text styles
  • Font loading with multiple typefaces

Building and Running

Desktop

# Run in debug mode
cargo run -- --debug

# Run in release mode
cargo run --release

Testing

The project includes tests for:

  • Database path configuration
  • Command-line argument parsing
  • Column initialization

Run tests with:

cargo test

Configuration and Data Paths

  • Desktop: Uses the platform-specific data location or current directory
  • Android: Uses the Android app's internal storage
  • Custom paths can be specified via command-line arguments

Advanced Debugging

  • Enable the debug-widget-callstack feature to debug UI hierarchy
  • Enable the debug-interactive-widgets feature to highlight interactive areas
  • Android logging uses tracing-logcat for detailed diagnostics

Code Workflow

  1. notedeck.rs is the entry point, which initializes Notedeck
  2. setup.rs configures the application environment
  3. Chrome is created and populated with applications
  4. The main UI loop renders the sidebar and active application

Key Files for Modification

  • chrome.rs - To modify the sidebar or app container behavior
  • theme.rs - To update theming and colors
  • setup.rs - To change startup configuration
  • android.rs - For Android-specific changes

Adding a New Application

  1. Implement the notedeck::App trait for your application
  2. Add a new variant to the NotedeckApp enum if needed
  3. Update the Chrome::topdown_sidebar method to add a button for your app
  4. Add your app to the Chrome instance in notedeck.rs