Three real-world adjustments to the default config that ships with a
fresh install:
- HellionThemeWindowOpacity 0.92 -> 0.5 so a fresh install lands at
the more glass-like default the maintainer uses daily
- Use24HourClock false -> true to match a German / European locale.
Works correctly thanks to the v0.5.1 strict-format fix that uses
CultureInfo.InvariantCulture instead of the host culture
- HellionParty preset Channel: InputChannel.Party -> null. Auto-
routing /party into a tab that also collects /alliance and /pvpteam
surprises the user when they wanted to type into the other ones;
the tab stays as a read surface
LoadPreviousSession and FilterIncludePreviousSessions stay false to
keep the privacy-strict 'every session starts fresh' line. The
maintainer's personal settings flip them on, but that's an
opt-in choice, not a default we should ship to every fresh install.
RetentionEnabled also stays false for the same opt-in reason.
Four defaults now match what a daily-driver Hellion install ends up at
anyway, so a fresh install does not feel like the wrong product:
- HellionThemeWindowOpacity 0.92 -> 0.5 (more glass-like)
- LoadPreviousSession + FilterIncludePreviousSessions false -> true
(tabs pick up where they left off after a crash or restart). The
privacy filter still gates what goes into the store; loading what
is already in there is not an additional privacy cost.
- Use24HourClock false -> true (matches a German / European locale,
works with the strict CultureInfo.InvariantCulture format from the
v0.5.1 fix).
RetentionEnabled stays at false because that one is a documented
opt-in privacy line, not a UX default. The persistent retention sweep
should require an explicit user gesture even though my own install
has it on.
- Configuration.cs: ShowTitleBar defaults to true so a fresh install
shows the window header instead of leaving the user without a drag
handle and hide button
- Configuration.cs: MaxLinesToRender default drops from 10000 to 5000
to match the slider's intended ceiling and the previous user-tuned
baseline
- ChatLogWindow.cs: 24h-clock checkbox now actually flips the format.
The Bestand path passed null culture which on a German system
locale always rendered 24h regardless of the toggle
- Appearance.cs + ChatLogWindow.cs + Popout.cs: when Hellion theme is
enabled the global theme opacity drives the chat-window BgAlpha and
the legacy WindowAlpha slider is disabled, so the two opacity
controls no longer fight each other
- Appearance.cs: ticking UseHellionFont now flips FontsEnabled off so
the two mutually-exclusive font stacks no longer appear active at
the same time
The webinterface fields are gone from the Configuration class so any
existing entries (WebinterfacePassword, AuthStore, WebinterfacePort
and friends) get dropped on the next save automatically — Newtonsoft
silently skips properties the target type does not declare. The
version bump itself is what stops the one-shot notification from
firing on every launch.
A new pair of HellionStrings entries (EN + DE) explains the change to
users coming from 0.1.x. Title: "Hellion Chat 0.2.0", body points at
the README for context. Notification fires once per upgrade.
Webinterface adds a third-party HTTP surface that contradicts the
DSGVO-by-default promise: it broadcasts every chat message including
filtered ChatTypes (privacy filter only covers DB writes), ships a
five-digit numeric auth code seeded from System.Random, binds on all
interfaces by default and sets cookies without security flags.
Hardening it for our threat model would land 500+ lines of code and
permanent maintenance for a feature very few users actually use. The
forks audience wants less surface, not more, so the entire feature is
being removed in a focused commit cluster. This first commit drops
the user-facing surface: settings tab class, tab registration and
the Configuration fields plus their UpdateFrom mirror.
Replace the inherited Chat 2 icon with the 1024×1024 Hellion logo
from the Hellion Online Media brand assets so the plugin shows
its real identity in Dalamud's plugin list. Bundle Exo 2 Variable
(SIL Open Font License 1.1) as an embedded resource together with
the OFL license text — keeps the license travelling with the font
inside the assembly as the OFL requires.
A new Configuration.UseHellionFont (default true) plus a checkbox
in the Privacy tab Appearance section route FontManager's regular
font handle through tk.AddFontFromMemory using the embedded TTF
bytes when the toggle is on; flipping it off falls back to the
existing AddFontWithFallback path so users who picked their own
system font under Settings → Fonts keep that choice.
Settings.cs now treats UseHellionFont as a font-changing setting
so toggling it triggers FontManager.BuildFonts on save without
needing a plugin reload.
True per-window focus-aware transparency would require touching
ChatLogWindow and SettingsWindow individually (both upstream code,
both prone to cherry-pick churn). Instead expose a single opacity
slider that mixes a configured alpha into the WindowBg color in
PushGlobal — applies to every Hellion-rendered pane uniformly,
the game shines through, and form fields / dialogs / popups stay
opaque on top so input remains readable.
Default 92%, range clamped to 0.5–1.0 in the UI and 0x55–0xFF in
the alpha conversion so users can't accidentally make the panes
disappear entirely. Slider sits inside the Appearance section
right under the master Hellion-theme checkbox and is greyed out
when the theme is disabled.
Move from a local color stack inside Hellion-only surfaces to a
single push wrapping Plugin.Draw, so chat log, settings,
viewers, the file dialog and the wizard all render under the same
palette. The local Push() helper stays for explicit use, but the
two existing call sites (Privacy tab, FirstRunWizard) now drop
their local pushes — the global stack already covers them and
double-pushing would shift colors on every frame.
Palette grew from a single cyan accent into a three-tone HUD set:
Primary cyan-teal (#00B8D4) → buttons, checkboxes, slider grabs,
separator hover/active.
Secondary industrial amber → scrollbar grab and resize-grip
(#FFB300) hover/active highlights.
Tertiary slate violet → active title bars and active tabs
(#7B61FF) so identity beats out the cyan
accent without competing with it on
action controls.
Surfaces are deep slate (#0E1A20 windows, #102027 children, #162831
frames) with steel borders (#37474F). Style variables flatten the
default Dalamud rounding into something more geometric: 4 px window
rounding, 2 px frame/grab/tab/scrollbar, 1 px borders.
A new Configuration.HellionThemeEnabled (default true) and a
matching Appearance section at the top of the Privacy tab let users
turn the whole thing off and fall back to the Dalamud default look.
The flag is checked once per frame in Plugin.Draw — `using
IDisposable? _ = ... ? PushGlobal() : null` — so disabling has zero
overhead beyond a bool check.
Fresh installs now open a setup window on first plugin load that
asks the user to pick one of three starting profiles. Existing
ChatTwo users keep skipping the wizard because the v6→v7 migration
sets Configuration.FirstRunCompleted = true on the same pass that
seeds the Privacy-First defaults — they already saw the migration
notification and can reopen the wizard from the Privacy tab if
they want to choose differently.
The three profiles map to concrete configuration sets:
Privacy-First (recommended): own-conversation whitelist (30
channels), retention enabled with the spec defaults (Tells 365
days, own-conversation channels 90, fallback 30).
Casual: Privacy-First plus public chat (Say/Shout/Yell, both
emote types, Novice Network) with a 1-day retention window so
RP players can scroll back the last scene without keeping
third-party speech forever.
Full History: filter off, retention off, GDPR warning shown
inline. Behaves like upstream Chat 2.
The wizard window is non-modal but covers a wide layout (three
side-by-side cards) and closing it without picking anything is
treated as accepting whatever defaults are already in place. The
Privacy tab gains a "show wizard again" button at the top so the
choice is reversible.
GetRetentionDays previously dropped straight from a missing user
override to RetentionDefaultDays, so every channel showed 30 days
in the UI even though the spec lists 365 for Tells and 90 for own-
conversation channels. Insert a middle layer: user override → spec
default → global default. The retention sweep now seeds its policy
from PrivacyDefaults.DefaultRetentionDays first and lets explicit
user overrides win on top, and the per-channel UI tags each row as
[override], [spec], or [global] so the source of the value is
visible without guessing.
Privacy filter trimmed history "by what" — this adds the time axis.
Each ChatType gets its own retention window in days; channels
without an explicit override fall back to a configurable global
default. The master switch defaults to OFF: the plugin never
deletes history without explicit user consent.
MessageStore.DeleteByRetentionPolicy builds an OR'd WHERE clause
over (ChatType = X AND Date < cutoff_X) plus a NOT IN catch-all
for the global default, hard-deletes matches, and only runs VACUUM
when something was actually removed.
Plugin.RunRetentionSweepIfDue runs at most once per 24 hours on a
background thread (off the load path) and persists the timestamp
so subsequent restarts skip the sweep until enough time has
passed. The Privacy tab gains a retention section with the master
switch, default-days input, per-channel override tree, reset
buttons, and a Ctrl+Shift "apply now" action that mirrors the
auto-sweep but on demand.
Spec defaults: Tells 365 days, own-conversation channels (Party,
Cross-Party, Alliance, PvP Team, FC, Linkshells 1-8, Cross-World
Linkshells 1-8, ExtraChat 1-8) 90 days, fallback 30 days.
Introduce an opt-out channel whitelist so the database only persists
messages from channels the user explicitly wants to keep. Default
profile follows GDPR data minimization: own conversations only
(Tells, Party, FC, Linkshells, Cross-World Linkshells, Alliance,
ExtraChat). Public chat (Say/Shout/Yell), Novice Network, NPC
dialogue and system logs are dropped by default.
The filter sits inside MessageStore.UpsertMessage so any current or
future write path is covered uniformly. Configuration provides an
IsAllowedForStorage(ChatType) helper plus a "persist unknown
channels" failsafe (default off) for ChatTypes added by future
patches.
A new Privacy settings tab exposes the whitelist as grouped
checkboxes with three preset buttons (Privacy-First, Clear all,
Select all). Configuration version bumps from 6 to 7; existing
users are migrated to the Privacy-First defaults on first load
and notified once via the Dalamud notification manager.
Also includes a small .env.example and gitignore hygiene for local
development setup.
- Plugin commands trigger the command helper window now
- Fix auto translation with empty text appearing
- Switch up all dalamud payload usage to ROSS if possible
- Prepare 7.5 changes
- Cleanup
- /chat2Viewer is now sorted by date
- Echo everything that hasn't any channel set
- Fixed channel inputs are now enforced
- Added a warning for ECL channel mismatch
- Adds new setting "Enable inactivity hide during battle" (default:
true) which determines whether autohide should apply during battle
(thanks @aurieh)
- Adds new setting "Chat channels considered for activity" which allows
customizing which channels incoming messages must match to "bump" the
inactivity timer
- Adds new per-tab setting "Unhide the chat window on activity" to
configure whether it will be considered for "bumping" the inactivity
timer when receiving messages that match the new channel filter. Note
that the foreground tab is currently always considered.
- Extends autohide code to apply to poped-out tabs as well. Each popout
window has its own inactivity timer, but focusing the main window will
restore all popped out windows.
Co-authored-by: Auri <me@aurieh.me>
Adds two configurable hotkeys (plus the required code infrastructure to
handle configurable hotkeys) for cycling the active chat tab forward by
one and backwards by one.
After not receiving a message for X seconds (configurable) in the
current tab or any tab with unread mode enabled, the chat will be
hidden. Focus can be returned with return or slash as usual.
Having input focus or hovering the mouse over the chat window "bumps"
it every frame.
Also fixes a bug that prevented focus from being restored to tabs with
input disabled. The chat window will be brought back but the activated
event won't be fully processed.
Co-authored-by: Auri <me@aurieh.me>
JonKazama-Hellion
Infi
Simon Schürrle
Dean Sheather