Quick Pane v1 Design

Goal

Quick Pane is a small native window opened by a desktop/window-manager hotkey. It accepts one short request and returns either a useful answer or an explicit escalation within 60 seconds.

Scope

Cold-launchable, independent Tauri window.
Compact request input, quick-model picker, and workspace picker.
Configured default workspace, quick model, follow-up model, supplemental prompt, time limit, and read-only tool limit.
Ephemeral Quick Pane UI state and best-effort runtime cleanup.
Advisory read-only/no-subagent instructions, inline permission/clarification prompts, and explicit normal-session handoff.

Non-goals

Persisted quick history.
Named profiles.
App-managed WM binding writes.
Trusted prevention of mutable tools or direct edits.
Trusted prevention of subagents.
A memory-only Pi runtime; Pi may write temporary session data while running.

Invocation

Desktop/WM configuration owns the hotkey so it works while Pi GUI is absent. Settings displays and copies the required command; it does not register or modify system bindings.

The app creates or focuses a dedicated small Quick Pane window. Esc closes it and discards quick-only state.

Request lifecycle

Pane chooses configured default workspace and quick model, with per-request overrides.
It starts an isolated Pi RPC runtime in the chosen workspace.
Immutable prompt text instructs one request, read-only inspection, zero subagents, configured wall-clock budget, and configured tool-call budget. Current Pi RPC cannot trusted-enforce those instructions; event-derived caps and cleanup are best effort.
Supplemental user instructions append beneath those prompt guardrails.
Pane streams answer, tool status, and inline extension requests.
On success it displays final answer. On a cap it preserves partial answer, explains the cap, and offers handoff.

Escalation

Mutations, subagents, multi-step work, and likely-over-budget work preflight-escalate. The quick agent explains why. The user clicks Continue in full session to open a new normal session with:

original request;
escalation note or partial findings;
selected workspace; and
configured follow-up model.

No full session opens automatically.

Permissions and privacy

Quick Pane surfaces Pi extension select, confirm, input, and editor requests inline. User explicitly answers every prompt. Existing policy remains authoritative: ordinary workspace reads may be allowed, external-directory reads may ask, and sensitive paths may deny.

Quick Pane UI request, output, and transcript stay in memory only. Closing pane removes them and triggers best-effort quick-runtime cleanup. Pi may write temporary session data while the child runs. A deliberate handoff persists only in newly created normal-session history.

Failure handling

Unavailable models, startup failures, and crashes render inline actionable errors: retry, pick another quick model, or open normal session. No silent fallback model is used.

Settings validation

Settings reject invalid model, workspace, custom prompt, or numeric limit. Failed save keeps previously stored configuration and marks invalid fields.

Acceptance

From cold or hot desktop state, the hotkey produces an answer or explicit escalation within 60 seconds. Automated component, bridge, persistence, and native tests cover behavior; a manual cold-launch/hotkey smoke test verifies desktop integration.

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