Hot Updates (OTA) — Manual Testing

The out-of-the-box experience for new users.

Setup

# Ensure no prior OTA cache exists
rm -rf ~/Library/Application\ Support/Anton/ui-cache

# Ensure manual mode (or just remove the key — manual is the default)
grep -v 'UI_UPDATE_MODE' ~/.anton/.env > /tmp/.env.tmp && mv /tmp/.env.tmp ~/.anton/.env
grep -v 'DEV_MODE' ~/.anton/.env > /tmp/.env.tmp && mv /tmp/.env.tmp ~/.anton/.env

Steps

1. Build the app: PATH="/opt/homebrew/opt/node@20/bin:$PATH" npm run pack
2. Launch from Terminal: ./release/mac-arm64/Anton.app/Contents/MacOS/Anton
3. Watch the Terminal output.

What to verify

• Terminal shows [ui-updater] checking log lines (no errors)
• The app loads normally with the bundled renderer (no blank screen)
• After a few seconds, a small green-accented banner appears in the sidebar footer area saying "Update available (2.0.4-e94e713)" with an "Install" label
• The banner is unobtrusive — it doesn't block any UI or force action
• Clicking the banner starts the download — you may briefly see a full-screen overlay with a spinner and "Updating to 2.0.4-e94e713…"
• The app reloads with the new bundle — the UI looks the same (it's the same codebase, just delivered via OTA)
• After reload, the sidebar banner is gone (we're now up to date)

Verify the cache

# Should now have files
ls ~/Library/Application\ Support/Anton/ui-cache/current/
# Should contain index.html and assets

cat ~/Library/Application\ Support/Anton/ui-cache/version.json
# Should show {"version":"2.0.4-e94e713"}

Setup

Run Test 1 first so the cache is populated with the latest version.

Steps

1. Quit and relaunch: ./release/mac-arm64/Anton.app/Contents/MacOS/Anton

What to verify

• Terminal shows the update check but reports no new version
• No update banner appears in the sidebar
• The app loads from the cached OTA bundle (check Terminal for the file path in any load logs)

Setup

# Clear cache to force a fresh download
rm -rf ~/Library/Application\ Support/Anton/ui-cache

# Set auto mode
echo 'UI_UPDATE_MODE=auto' >> ~/.anton/.env

Steps

1. Launch: ./release/mac-arm64/Anton.app/Contents/MacOS/Anton

What to verify

• The app starts and shows its normal UI briefly
• A full-screen overlay appears with a spinner and "Updating to …" message
• After a few seconds (download time), the overlay says "Almost there…"
• The app reloads automatically — no user interaction needed
• After reload, the app is running the OTA bundle (check version.json)
• No update banner appears (auto mode doesn't use the banner)

Cleanup

# Remove the auto mode setting to go back to default (manual)
grep -v 'UI_UPDATE_MODE' ~/.anton/.env > /tmp/.env.tmp && mv /tmp/.env.tmp ~/.anton/.env

Setup

# Clear cache
rm -rf ~/Library/Application\ Support/Anton/ui-cache

Steps

1. Disconnect from the internet (turn off Wi-Fi, or use an airplane-mode equivalent)
2. Launch: ./release/mac-arm64/Anton.app/Contents/MacOS/Anton

What to verify

• Terminal shows something like [ui-updater] timeout or connectivity failure (not a crash)
• The app loads normally with the bundled renderer — no blank screen, no error
• No update banner appears
• The app is fully functional (aside from features that need the network)

Then

1. Reconnect to the internet
2. Quit and relaunch

• The update check now succeeds and the banner (or auto-update) kicks in

For developers who want renderer changes in real time without rebuilding the full app.

Setup

echo 'DEV_MODE=live' >> ~/.anton/.env

Steps — with dev server running

1. In one terminal, start the Vite dev server:

   PATH="/opt/homebrew/opt/node@20/bin:$PATH" npm run dev:renderer

   Wait until it says the server is ready on localhost:5173.
2. In another terminal, launch the packaged app:

   ./release/mac-arm64/Anton.app/Contents/MacOS/Anton

What to verify

• Terminal shows [main] DEV_MODE=live — loading from http://localhost:5173
• The app loads the renderer from the Vite dev server, not from the bundled/cached files
• If you edit a file under src/renderer/, Vite hot-reloads it in the running app window
• No OTA update check runs — no [ui-updater] log lines appear
• The Python server still starts and works normally

Steps — without dev server running

1. Stop the Vite dev server (Ctrl+C)
2. Launch the packaged app again

• The app window shows an error page (ERR_CONNECTION_REFUSED or similar) — this is expected
• The app does NOT crash — it just can't reach localhost:5173

Cleanup

grep -v 'DEV_MODE' ~/.anton/.env > /tmp/.env.tmp && mv /tmp/.env.tmp ~/.anton/.env

For developers who want to test the packaged build end-to-end but don't want OTA to override their local changes.

Setup

# Populate the OTA cache so we can verify it gets ignored
# (run Test 1 first if the cache is empty)

echo 'DEV_MODE=full' >> ~/.anton/.env

Steps

1. Launch: ./release/mac-arm64/Anton.app/Contents/MacOS/Anton

What to verify

• Terminal shows [main] DEV_MODE=full — using bundled renderer, skipping OTA cache
• The app loads from the app bundle, NOT from ui-cache/current/
• No OTA update check runs
• If you had a different version cached in ui-cache/, it is ignored

Cleanup

grep -v 'DEV_MODE' ~/.anton/.env > /tmp/.env.tmp && mv /tmp/.env.tmp ~/.anton/.env

Steps

1. Launch the app (packaged or dev mode — Settings UI works in both)
2. Navigate to Settings (gear icon in the sidebar)
3. Scroll down and expand the Updates section

What to verify

• There is a segmented control with two options: Manual and Auto
• The default selection is Manual
• Clicking Auto switches the selection visually
• Click Save settings
• Verify the setting was persisted:

  grep UI_UPDATE_MODE ~/.anton/.env
  # Should show: UI_UPDATE_MODE=auto

• Switch back to Manual and save again
• Verify:

  grep UI_UPDATE_MODE ~/.anton/.env
  # Should show: UI_UPDATE_MODE=manual

If a bad OTA bundle is deployed, users can recover by clearing the cache.

Steps

1. After running any test that populated the cache:

   rm -rf ~/Library/Application\ Support/Anton/ui-cache

2. Relaunch the app

What to verify

• The app loads the bundled renderer (the version shipped inside Anton.app)
• On next launch with internet, OTA check runs and re-downloads the latest bundle

Steps

1. Launch the packaged app
2. Click Anton in the menu bar > About Anton

What to verify

• If running the OTA bundle, the version shows something like 2.0.4 (UI: 2.0.4-e94e713)
• If running the bundled renderer (no cache), it shows just 2.0.4 or 2.0.4 (UI: bundled)

Verify that the normal development workflow is unaffected.

Setup

# Make sure DEV_MODE is NOT set
grep -v 'DEV_MODE' ~/.anton/.env > /tmp/.env.tmp && mv /tmp/.env.tmp ~/.anton/.env

Steps

1. PATH="/opt/homebrew/opt/node@20/bin:$PATH" npm run dev

What to verify

• The app starts with Vite hot-reloading as usual
• No OTA checks run (because app.isPackaged is false in dev)
• No update banner appears
• Everything works as it did before this feature