Changelog

Every release of Jolt.

Newest first. All modules share one version number. Jolt is early software (0.x), so this page says when an API changes.

  1. v0.3.1

    Latest

    Fixed

    • Windows: no notification was shown when Windows could not read the app's notification setting. Windows keeps a settings entry for an app, and reading it (get_Setting) can fail with ERROR_NOT_FOUND (0x80070490). Jolt treated that as an error, so Application.notify failed with "Reading the notification setting failed" and the toast was never tried. Now a setting that cannot be read is treated as unknown and the toast is attempted anyway (Show still reports a real failure). A setting that Windows does report (off for the app, off for the user, policy) is still respected and still completes the future with false.

    Added

    • WebWindow.isFocused(): whether the window is the one the user is typing into (shown, not minimized, and the active window of the system). Windows: the foreground window (GetForegroundWindow). Linux: GDK's FOCUSED window state, kept up to date from the window-state signal. Use it to decide, for example, whether new mail needs a notification or can just appear in the list. It is false while a dialog of the application is in front.

    Changed

    • API change that can break code that implements WebWindow (0.x): WebWindow has the new abstract method isFocused.

  2. v0.3.0

    Added

    • System notifications: Application.notify(Notification) shows a toast (WinRT Windows.UI.Notifications on Windows, the org.freedesktop.Notifications D-Bus service on Linux). On Windows the first call registers appId as a display name under HKCU\Software\Classes\AppUserModelId; nothing is installed. It completes with false when Windows has notifications turned off for the user or the app. Notification.withOnClick, withButton (up to 5) and withReply (a text field with a send button, Windows only: the Linux specification has no text input) run on the UI thread while the application is running. WebWindow.enableNotifications(app) lets trusted pages call jolt.notify(title, body) (a promise of whether the system showed it; at most 5 per 10 seconds per window). The page can pass { onclick, buttons: [{ label, onclick }], reply: { label, placeholder, onreply } } as a third argument; the callbacks run in the page when the user uses the notification.
    • More than one window (pop-outs): WebWindow.enableOpenWindow(app, WindowOpener) lets trusted pages call jolt.openWindow(path, { key, title, width, height }). The page never opens anything itself: the app's WindowOpener receives an OpenWindowRequest, creates the window (with request.createWindow(app), which enables the new window before it can load a page) or refuses, and the promise resolves with whether a window opened. path must be an address inside the app (one leading /), a window may make at most 10 requests per 10 seconds, and asking again for the same key brings the existing window to the front instead of opening another. ResourceOptions.withStartPath("/message/42") makes a window open on its own page. jolt.broadcast(text) and jolt.onBroadcast(callback) send short text between the windows of an application (never back to the sender).
    • Owner windows: WindowOptions.withOwner(window): the new window stays in front of its owner, minimizes with it and closes with it (Win32 owner window; gtk_window_set_transient_for on Linux). Application.windows() lists the open windows.
    • Window state: WebWindow.focus() (shows, restores and raises the window), minimize(), isMinimized(), isVisible().
    • Close to tray: WebWindow.setCloseBehavior(CloseBehavior.HIDE) makes the close button (and Alt+F4) only hide the window, and can be changed at any time. close(), Application.quit() and the end of the user's session still close it.
    • Tray icon: Application.isTraySupported() and createTray(icon, tooltip) return a Tray with setIcon, setTooltip, onClick and setMenu(TrayMenu); a TrayMenu holds actions, checkboxes, separators and submenus and is rebuilt to change it. Windows: a notification-area icon with a native menu (dark when the system is dark, through an undocumented call that is skipped if missing); the icon comes back if Explorer restarts. Linux: a StatusNotifierItem with a dbusmenu menu, shown by KDE Plasma, XFCE, Cinnamon, MATE, Budgie and others; stock GNOME needs its AppIndicator extension, and without a tray host isTraySupported() is false and createTray throws UnsupportedOperationException. A Linux icon is not registered again if the tray host restarts while the application runs.
    • Start with the computer: Application.autostart() returns an Autostart (enable(command), disable(), isEnabled(), Autostart.currentCommand(extraArgs)): a value under HKCU\...\Run on Windows, a ~/.config/autostart/<appId>.desktop file on Linux; no administrator rights. Add an argument such as --minimized to the command and read it at launch to start hidden in the tray.
    • SingleInstance.acquire(options, args, onOtherLaunch): keeps one copy of the application per user. A second copy hands its arguments to the first (a lock file in the data directory and a Unix domain socket only the same user can reach) and learns it is not the primary.
    • Frameless windows: WindowOptions.withFrameless(true) removes the system title bar and border. In the page, data-jolt-drag marks the area that moves the window (a double click maximizes or restores it), thin invisible handles resize it, and jolt.frame.minimize(), toggleMaximize() and close() are the window buttons. The commands travel over the normal message bridge, work with loadHtml, and never reach the application's onMessage listeners. Windows keeps the sizing frame, so the system should still draw the shadow and snap the window; Linux draws no shadow.

    Changed

    • API changes that can break code that implements Jolt's interfaces or builds its records with the long constructors (0.x): WebWindow has the new abstract methods focus, minimize, isMinimized, isVisible, setCloseBehavior and closeBehavior; Application has the new abstract method windows(); the WindowOptions record gained the components owner and frameless (use defaults() and the with... methods), and ResourceOptions gained startPath (new ResourceOptions(maxBytes) still works).
    • The README documents notifications, pop-outs, the tray, autostart, single instance and frameless windows.
    • README, Linux uploads: Jolt's workaround for the WebKitGTK crash on Blob request bodies does not reach Web Workers. A worker must send strings or ArrayBuffers (await blob.arrayBuffer()), never a Blob or a FormData holding one, because WebKitGTK aborts the whole process. A new Linux test checks that strings and bytes from a worker work over the in-process transport.

  3. v0.2.5

    Added

    • Application.openExternal(URI): opens an http, https or mailto address in the user's default browser or mail program (ShellExecuteW on Windows, g_app_info_launch_default_for_uri on Linux). Any other scheme, such as file:, throws IllegalArgumentException, because handing it to the shell could start a program. The future says whether the system accepted the request, not whether the page loaded. Useful from onBlocked to send a blocked link to the browser.
    • AppOptions.withQuietNativeLogs(boolean) (Linux, off by default): hides a short list of known harmless GTK warnings, such as GFileInfo created without standard::size from the file chooser. Every other native message is still printed. AppOptions gained the component quietNativeLogs; the old three-argument constructor still works.

    Changed

    • Linux: the process is named after the app id (g_set_prgname) before GTK starts, so on Wayland the window's app_id is your app id instead of java and the compositor can find the icon through <appId>.desktop.
    • The README is shorter and simpler.

  4. v0.2.4

    Added

    • File dialogs: WebWindow.dialogs() returns Dialogs, the operating system's own open, save and choose-folder dialogs (openFile, openFiles, saveFile, chooseFolder), owned by the window. Each returns a CompletableFuture that completes with the real path the user chose, or with an empty result when they cancel. FileDialogOptions sets the title, the starting folder, a proposed or preselected file name and FileFilters. Use them to read a file by its path, or to let the user pick where Java saves one. Windows uses the common item dialogs; Linux uses GtkFileChooserNative, which goes through the desktop portal when the app is sandboxed. FileDialogOptions.withSize(width, height) asks for a bigger dialog (Windows resizes it after it opens; on Linux a dialog with a size is GTK's own chooser instead of the portal's). Tested with the real dialogs on Windows and on Linux (X11 and Wayland, in Docker).
    • jolt.saveAs(data, options) in the page, after window.enableSaveAs() (optionally with the starting folder) in Java: opens the save dialog, then writes the string, bytes or Blob the page hands over to the file the user chose. The page learns only the file name. The data goes to a temporary file that replaces the target when complete, so a failed transfer leaves nothing half written. Channel names starting with jolt. are now reserved.

  5. v0.2.3

    Added

    • Binary channels: WebWindow.openChannel(name[, ChannelOptions]) returns a BinaryChannel, a named two-way pipe for raw bytes between Java and the page (jolt.channel(name) in the page, with onMessage, send, onOpen, onClose). For video frames, audio, images, files and other data that is too big or too binary for postMessage. ChannelOptions.newestOnly() makes a slow page get only the newest message instead of a backlog. The transport is a loopback WebSocket that accepts only origins the window's SecurityPolicy trusts and a per-run secret. Tested against a plain WebSocket client and in real windows on Windows and on Linux (X11 and Wayland). On Linux the page must be shown with loadResources: WebKitGTK blocks the connection from a loadHtml page.
    • WindowOptions.withMinSize(width, height): the smallest size the user can resize the window to (Windows WM_GETMINMAXINFO, GTK geometry hints). WindowOptions gained the components minWidth and minHeight, so code that calls its constructor directly (rather than defaults() and the with methods) needs two more arguments. Checked on Windows and on Linux under X11.

  6. v0.2.2

    Added

    • WindowOptions.withMaximized(boolean) and withCentered(boolean), and WebWindow.maximize(), restore() and isMaximized(). New windows are now centered on the screen by default (before, Windows cascaded them from the top-left). Use withCentered(false) to get the operating system's own placement back. Centering is ignored on Wayland, where the compositor decides, and when the window starts maximized.
    • On Windows the native window is painted with backgroundRgb behind the web view, so a window no longer starts out white while the web view is still starting.
    • Contract tests for a hidden window that is shown later, and for maximizing; WindowPlacementTest (Windows) reads back the window position, maximized state and painted background; an X11 test reads the centered position from GTK.

    Fixed

    • A window created hidden (withVisible(false)) and shown later stayed blank on Windows: the web view was never told that its window had become visible. It is now, including when the window is shown maximized.

    Changed

    • WindowOptions has two more record components (maximized, centered). Code that uses WindowOptions.defaults() and the with... methods is unaffected; code that calls the record's constructor directly has to pass them.
    • WebWindow has three more methods; custom implementations of the interface (there are none in Jolt besides the two backends) have to add them.

  7. v0.2.1

    Added

    • jolt-credentials, a new optional module: CredentialStore.open(service) with put, get and delete keeps passwords and tokens in the operating system's keystore, through the FFM API (no JNI, no native code to build).
      • Windows: Credential Manager (CredWriteW, CredReadW, CredDeleteW). A secret is at most 2560 bytes in UTF-8.
      • Linux: the Secret Service through libsecret (GNOME Keyring, KWallet, KeePassXC).
      • CredentialStore.open throws CredentialStoreUnavailableException when the machine has no usable keystore (unsupported OS, no libsecret, no Secret Service, or no default keyring), so an application can fall back.
      • It does not depend on jolt-core.
      • Verified: Windows 11 against the real Credential Manager, and Linux (Ubuntu 24.04 in Docker) against gnome-keyring.

    Changed

    • README: new section on saving passwords and tokens, and the Maven and Gradle snippets use 0.2.1.

  8. v0.2.0

    Added

    • loadResources: a page made of separate HTML, CSS and JS files (or a bundler's output) served from inside the web view with no socket, with a stable origin so localStorage survives restarts. AppResources.classpath(...) and AppResources.directory(...).
    • Java request handlers for the page's own requests (fetch, forms, htmx, JSON APIs).
    • Router: method and path routing with path parameters, groups, filters and error handling.
    • multipart/form-data uploads with a configurable size limit (ResourceOptions).
    • On Linux, a page-side shim that rewrites Blob request bodies to bytes, because WebKitGTK aborts the process on them.

  9. v0.1.0

    • First release: native windows with a web view on Windows (WebView2) and Linux (WebKitGTK 4.1), loadUrl, loadHtml, eval, addInitScript, string messages between Java and the page, window icon, native title bar and background colours, and a per-window security policy.

Also on GitHub and Maven Central.