The main and Settings windows were created at startup and kept alive hidden on close, so an idle tray held two webview processes for surfaces the user may never open. Both are now built on first show and destroyed on close, which takes the idle footprint on macOS from ~160 MB to ~74 MB.
The WindowManager owns creation: it rebuilds the main window on the next show and hands out live pointers, since a stored one goes stale. Every show is deferred until the frontend reports it has rendered, so a freshly created window is never on screen empty, with a timeout so a frontend that never reports cannot strand a window hidden.
## Describe your changes
After the SSO session expires, the daemon tears the engine down
permanently
(management returns `PermissionDenied` → `runCancel()` → the retry loop
exits
for good). The "Session expired" dialog's Login button still drove the
extend-session flow, which requires a live engine: the user completed
the full
browser SSO + 2FA round trip only to get
`Failed to extend the session — engine is not initialised`, with no way
out
other than quitting and relaunching the client.
Reproduce:
1. Log in on a desktop client with session expiration enabled (e.g. 16h
TTL).
2. Let the session expire (e.g. leave the machine asleep overnight).
3. Wake it, click **Login** on the "Session expired" dialog, complete
SSO + 2FA.
4. The error dialog appears and every retry fails the same way.
Changes:
- The expired branch of the session-expiration dialog now emits
`trigger-login`, driving the full `Login → SSO → Up` sequence that
rebuilds
the client, instead of the extend flow (an expired session can no longer
be
extended).
- `RequestExtendAuthSession` fails fast when the engine is already gone,
so the
browser/2FA round trip is not wasted on a doomed extend.
- The expired tray row navigated the main window to `/#/login`, a route
that
does not exist and fell through to the main page without starting a
login;
it now emits `trigger-login` as well.
## Issue ticket number and link
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Required for anything that changes behavior. Link the issue (or the
validated
discussion it came from) that the NetBird team already agreed on. See
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## Stack
<!-- branch-stack -->
### Checklist
- [x] Is it a bug fix
- [ ] Is a typo/documentation fix
- [ ] Is a feature enhancement
- [ ] It is a refactor
- [ ] Created tests that fail without the change (if possible)
- [ ] I ran and tested this change locally — I did not rely on CI to
find out whether it works
- [ ] This PR has a single purpose (not a fix + refactor + feature in
one)
- [ ] This change is a trivial fix, **OR** it links an issue the NetBird
team agreed on beforehand. Changes to the public API, gRPC protocols,
functionality behavior, CLI / service flags, or new features always need
that agreement first. See
[CONTRIBUTING.md](https://github.com/netbirdio/netbird/blob/main/CONTRIBUTING.md#ticket-first-pr-second).
> By submitting this pull request, you confirm that you have read and
agree to the terms of the [Contributor License
Agreement](https://github.com/netbirdio/netbird/blob/main/CONTRIBUTOR_LICENSE_AGREEMENT.md).
## Documentation
Select exactly one:
- [ ] I added/updated documentation for this change
- [x] Documentation is **not needed** for this change (explain why)
### Docs PR URL (required if "docs added" is checked)
Paste the PR link from https://github.com/netbirdio/docs here:
https://github.com/netbirdio/docs/pull/__
<!-- This is an auto-generated comment: release notes by coderabbit.ai
-->
## Summary by CodeRabbit
- **Bug Fixes**
- Improved session extension handling when the client engine is
unavailable by prompting users to log in again.
- Updated expired-session behavior to trigger the standard login flow,
providing a more consistent sign-in experience.
<!-- end of auto-generated comment: release notes by coderabbit.ai -->
- **Wails v3 application** (`client/ui`) with a React + TypeScript + Tailwind frontend replacing the Fyne UI: main connection view, exit-node switcher, networks/peers browser with detail panels, profile management, settings (general, network, SSH, security, troubleshooting, appearance), debug-bundle creation, and a first-run welcome flow.
- **Internationalization**: go-i18n bundle with 9 locales (en, de, es, fr, hu, it, pt, ru, zh-CN) shared between the tray and the frontend.
- **New system tray** implementation with per-platform theme-aware icons, including a native XEmbed host for Linux (`xembed_tray_linux.c`) and a Linux theme watcher.
- **Session handling**: auth session watcher (`client/internal/auth/sessionwatch`), pending login flow, session-expiration dialog and tray notifications, and `netbird login` improvements.
- **Daemon API extensions** (`daemon.proto`): status stream subscription, event stream, networks/exit-node selection endpoints, and richer full status — with probe throttling on the daemon side to protect against UI-driven request storms.
- **UI preferences store** persisted per profile, autostart management via the daemon (single source of truth in HKCU on Windows).
- **Build system**: Taskfile-based builds per platform (macOS, Linux, Windows), Docker cross-compilation images, MSIX/NSIS/nfpm/AppImage packaging, and a new `frontend-ui` CI workflow.
Co-authored-by: Zoltan Papp <zoltan.pmail@gmail.com>
Co-authored-by: Eduard Gert <kontakt@eduardgert.de>
Co-authored-by: braginini <bangvalo@gmail.com>
Co-authored-by: Pascal Fischer <32096965+pascal-fischer@users.noreply.github.com>
Co-authored-by: riccardom <riccardomanfrin@gmail.com>
Viktor Liu
