30 KiB
Hellion Chat — Roadmap
Planned work after the v1.0.0 standalone cut. This list is intentionally high-level: concrete specs,
size estimates and repro steps live in the internal backlog. External tracking runs via
Gitea Issues with the
roadmap label once an item is scheduled for a cycle.
Order reflects priority, not a guarantee. Items may shift or be dropped entirely if they turn out to be a poor fit for the plugin's privacy-first scope during brainstorming.
Next Cycle
v1.5.7 — Ad-Block / Spam-Filter is the next planned scope: the hybrid ad-block and
spam-filter cycle, combining a lightweight built-in filter with optional NoSoliciting
IPC integration. Plugin Integrations Wave 2-6 (Context-Menu, NotificationMaster, Moodles,
ExtraChat, XIVIM Quick-DM) follows.
Native-speaker review of the AI-assisted v1.5.3 translations (13 legacy Crowdin locales) runs in parallel as a continuous correction pass, gathered via the Hellion Forge Discord.
v1.5.6 — Settings Overhaul + Filter & Notification Polish (released 2026-05-23)
Settings window reorganised from ten tabs to seven (General, Appearance, Chat, Window, Channels, Data & Privacy, About). Each tab uses collapsible sections grouped by control type; sections start collapsed on every tab-open.
Delivered from the originally-planned v1.5.5b bundle:
- UI-7 — Sender-name display options: world-suffix mode (Never / Other worlds only / Always) and name-format mode (Full name / First name only / Initials). Lives in Chat → Messages.
- UI-11 — Pre-send warning when a message contains plugin-only symbols. Toggle in Chat → Messages.
- UI-12 — Separate window opacity for focused vs. inactive chat window. New slider in Appearance → Window style.
- AUDIO-1 — Custom notification sound volume slider. General → Sound, mirrored in Channels → per-tab → Notification. Affects only the three bundled custom sounds.
UI-8— GESTRICHEN: per-tab regex filter. Removed because FFXIV's built-in blackword filter covers the same need.
All 24 locale files updated for new section labels and v1.5.6 control labels (machine translation; native review via Hellion Forge Discord).
v1.5.5 — Upstream-Sync Tab-Features (released 2026-05-21)
A backlog-sync cycle of inherited tab-feature items. Failed tells now raise a warning toast when a message could not be delivered (recipient offline, in an instance, or blocking you), toggleable in Settings. Per-tab notification sounds let each tab play one of the 16 game chat sounds or three bundled Hellion sounds when a message arrives on a background tab, with a preview button. The tab rename field in the right-click menu auto-focuses on open and accepts up to 512 characters. A jump-to-latest button appears in the chat log header while scrolled up from the live end. Map-flag and item-link insertion is available from the chat input right-click menu. The Hellion Forge fox banner in the first-run wizard and the Information tab is now a real image instead of ASCII art. Schema bumped to v18, additive fields only, no data migration.
v1.5.4 — Polish and Motion (released 2026-05-20)
A polish cycle of three P3 items. Theme switches crossfade over ~300 ms across every Hellion-rendered surface; the window background snaps deliberately to preserve the per-window opacity override from Dalamud's pinning menu. A header quick-picker — a palette button left of the cog — switches themes and tabs from a compact popup without opening Settings. Sidebar icons and card-mode borders gain framerate-independent hover animations. A new "Reduce motion" toggle in Theme & Layout covers accessibility. No schema bump; migration v17 stays.
v1.5.3 — Localisation Wave + Bundled-Font Overhaul (released 2026-05-19)
Twenty-four selectable UI languages: from FR-only as the original plan scope, the cycle expanded to cover Catalan, Czech, Danish, Finnish, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, Korean, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese (Portugal), Turkish and Ukrainian alongside the existing Crowdin-heritage locales, all AI-translated and flagged for community review. Bundled font swaps from Exo 2 to Inter Light for wider European glyph coverage (Latin Extended-A/B, Greek polytonic, Cyrillic Supplement); NotoSansCjkRegular joins as a third merge layer so Hangul and Simplified-Chinese-specific Han glyphs render correctly inside the HellionChat UI.
First-frame HITCH dropped from ~74 ms to a median of ~20 ms (5-reload sample 17.9-23.6 ms,
Linux/Wine) as a side effect: the bundled-font path was silently falling back to the FFXIV Axis
game font for the entire v1.5.x series because of an early-return in Plugin.cs:937. The fix
routes RegularFont through draw whenever either FontsEnabled or UseHellionFont is on, and
lands the defer-pattern win v1.5.1 was reaching for.
ExtraGlyphRanges auto-activates the matching flag on language change. Two new flags
(LatinExtended, Greek) join the existing set. Plugin init runs a one-shot migration that ORs
the required flag into the saved config for users updating from v1.5.2 with a non-default language
already selected. A WarningText under the language dropdown notes that FFXIV's own chat input only
fully supports EN/DE/FR/JA — other languages may garble when typed into in-game chat.
Migration v17 stays. LanguageOverride enum grows by ten locales plus three previously
commented-out (Italian, Korean, Norwegian with code nb); all new values append to keep existing
user-config integer serialisation stable.
v1.5.2 — First-Run Wizard Rework (released 2026-05-18)
Multi-step wizard replacement: Welcome → Privacy → Power Settings → Done with staged-commit so
Decide-later or X-close at any point leaves the existing config untouched. New fourth privacy
profile "Roleplay" extends Privacy-First with Say and both emote types under a 30-/90-day
retention window. Privacy picker becomes a 2×2 grid; Casual keeps the ★ recommended marker. A new
power-settings stage surfaces six previously-hidden Configuration fields (Load Previous Session,
Filter Include Previous Sessions, Auto-Tell-Tabs History Preload, Compact Density, Prettier
Timestamps, built-in theme picker) without introducing any new fields.
Window default size shrinks from 900×560 to 720×480 (MinimumSize 600×400) and Step 1 wraps the fox
banner in a folded TreeNode after smoke feedback. Existing v1.5.1 users see the new wizard once on
first v1.5.2 boot via a new WizardLastShownVersion config marker.
Under the hood: WizardStateSmokeStep joins the /xlperf lineup, the Build Suite gains twelve
pure-helper xUnit Facts pinning all four privacy profile sets and the new Roleplay retention
overrides. Migration v17 stays — Configuration only grows one optional string field.
v1.5.1 — FontAtlas Refactor and Hellion Forge Signature (released 2026-05-17)
Hybrid FontManager refactor with init-only game-font handles plus a mutable delegate path for the
eight live font settings, all wired through a single IFontAtlas.SuppressAutoRebuild() block.
Atlas-build count drops from 4-5 per plugin load to 1. FontAwesome reuses Dalamud's
UiBuilder.IconFontFixedWidthHandle instead of building its own slot. BuildFontsAsync is removed,
BuildFonts renamed to RebuildDelegateFonts and scoped to the delegate fonts.
Plus an embedded Hellion Forge provenance mark: a fox-head ASCII silhouette in the /xllog
bootstrap banner, a full fox banner in the First-Run Wizard and Settings → Information tab. Drawn by
Julia Moon.
Honorific full-gradient port (originally the v1.5.1 main item) was dropped: Honorific 3.2 exposes no IPC for the rendered gradient frame, and an in-plugin port of the colour palette was declined. The integration stays at the v1.4.7 glow-only shape.
The cross-plugin baseline target from v1.5.0 (matching Lightless / XIVInstantMessenger at ~7 ms HITCH) did not land — HITCH stays around 80 ms because the cost lives in the UiBuilder first-frame render path, not in the atlas build. A first-frame render investigation is reserved for a later cycle.
v1.5.0 — DI Foundation and Service Refactor (released 2026-05-17)
Major architecture cycle. Plugin bootstrap moves to a generic-host DI container
(Microsoft.Extensions.Hosting + IServiceCollection) modelled on Lightless Sync's
PluginHostFactory. Service logging migrates from the static Plugin.LogProxy locator (the F12.2
shim from v1.4.7) to typed Microsoft.Extensions.Logging.ILogger<T> via constructor injection,
bridged over Dalamud's IPluginLog by a custom DalamudLogger trio. 18 instance-class services
move to ctor-injected loggers across four slices: data layer, IPC/integrations, UI window layer, and
root. Plugin.LogProxy stays for the eight buckets ctor injection cannot reach — static helpers
(EmoteCache, AutoTranslate, MemoryUtil, WrapperUtil), Dalamud-reflected types
(Configuration), the Message data class, and instance classes that only log from static methods
(FontManager, one GameFunctions site). Plugin.cs finishes at 1012 lines, virtually identical to
the pre-cycle 1013 (-1 netto): the new Phase-1 host build and Plugin.X bridge wiring trade out
exactly the service and window allocations that previously lived in LoadAsync. Cross-plugin
baseline (10 reload-stress runs, 51 active plugins): HellionChat first-frame HITCH 77 ms median,
Chat 2 v1.40.2 74 ms median — no DI penalty. The deferred-font-atlas pattern from Lightless and
XIVInstantMessenger is the v1.5.1 follow-up. User-visible: slash-command insert fix cherry-picked
from ChatTwo upstream ee7768ac — pasting a slash command into the chat input now replaces existing
input instead of concatenating. Migration v17 stays.
v1.4.10 — Symbol-Picker and Tell-History Fix (released 2026-05-16)
Eleventh and final sub-patch of the v1.4.x Polish Sweep series. Symbol picker for the chat input —
popup with two tabs (161 FFXIV PUA glyphs via Dalamud's SeIconChar plus 97 server-verified BMP
symbols probed through /echo and /say in a four-round whitelist build) — cursor-aware splice,
multi-insert, recent-used strip across both tabs, Settings toggle in Chat → Message behaviour.
Mid-cycle hotfix for pinned auto-tell tabs: PreloadHistory used to cap the SQL scan at 500 rows
regardless of the user's AutoTellTabsHistoryPreload setting, so active users with many partners
lost the backlog of less-frequent pinned partners; the cap is gone, the (Receiver, Date) index
keeps SQL fast, the client-side loop respects the user setting as the upper bound. Slash-command
teardown cleanup wires the v1.4.9 wrappers through private fields so dispose detaches the live
registration instead of re-registering with identical args. The original Reserve-A
ImGuiListClipper refactor for DrawMessages was cancelled after cross-platform smoke showed the
scroll rubber-band is a Wine/Linux render-pipeline quirk, not universal — Windows-side testing on
v1.4.9 confirmed no lag. Migration v17 stays.
v1.4.9 — Plugin-Load Render Polish (released 2026-05-15)
Tenth sub-patch of the v1.4.x Polish Sweep series. First-frame HITCH drops from ~127 ms median to
~76 ms median (4-reload sample), comfortably under Dalamud's 100 ms warning threshold. Mechanism: a
single _firstFrameDone flag inside ChatLogWindow defers six non-essential rendering sections
(bottom status bar, channel-name SeString chunks, window bounds check, v0.6.1 hint banner,
autocomplete, input-preview calculation) from frame 0 to frame 1. User sees those sections ~17 ms
(60 fps) later, invisible inside the ~2.5 s font-atlas build window after every reload.
Slash-command registration moved from individual window constructors to a central SetupCommands /
TearDownCommands pair in Plugin.cs — /hellion, /hellionView, /hellionSeString and
/hellionDebugger work before their target windows are opened the first time, and Dalamud's
plugin-manager OpenConfigUi / OpenMainUi buttons hang on the same path. Plugin-load profiling
logs (auto-translate warmup, MessageStore.Connect, MessageStore.Migrate, FilterAllTabs) stay
on at Information level as a regression tripwire. The release also ships a ChatTwo IPC compatibility
layer: HellionChat mirrors ChatTwo's full IPC surface (GetChatInputState, ChatInputStateChanged,
Register, Unregister, Available, Invoke) under the ChatTwo.* namespace in addition to our
existing HellionChat.* provider gates, so third-party integrations that only subscribe to
ChatTwo's IPC (Artisan, AllaganTools) keep working without a code change on their side. Conflict
detection prevents ChatTwo from loading in parallel, so there is no slot-collision risk at runtime.
Migration v17 stays (no schema bump). Hypothesis-triage falsified three of four candidate root
causes (font-atlas sync fallback, theme-apply ABGR-cache init, multiple-window render via lazy-init)
— actual cost distributes evenly across ~10 ImGui sections inside ChatLogWindow, so structural
rewrite is deferred to v1.5.x DI-container cycle.
v1.4.8 — Hook-Layer and Polish Quick-Wins (released 2026-05-14)
Ninth sub-patch of the v1.4.x Polish Sweep series. Database Viewer gains an optional FTS5 full-text
search across the full chat history, built asynchronously on first run after the update with a
progress toast; the local page-filter remains the default mode. Custom theme files auto-reload when
edited while the theme is active (1 Hz disk-stat throttle, so per-frame cost is free). Retention
sweep no longer blocks the framework thread — Framework.Run(...).Wait() is replaced by
Framework.RunOnTick(...), removing the ~194 ms hitch per sweep. Status-bar height is now derived
from GetTextLineHeightWithSpacing() plus a DPI-aware spacer so the bar renders correctly at
Windows display scaling above 100 %. Receive-suppressed-tells routing was investigated and
postponed to v1.5.x: when other plugins suppress tells via CheckMessageHandled, FFXIV's
chat-pipeline skips the RaptureLogModule.AddMsgSourceEntry path, which means the
ContentIdResolverHook does not fire and tell-partner identification breaks. The fix belongs next
to the planned ad-block hook layer where the same patch surface comes up anyway. Migration v17 stays
(no schema bump). H3 leaves a foundation note in the Vault
(Projekte/FFXIV/Hellion Chat/v1.5.x Ad-Block Foundation.md) covering the NoSoliciting filter +
bubble-layer hook pattern as a ready-made template for the v1.5.x cycle.
v1.4.7 — Backlog Cleanup and Mid-Features (released 2026-05-13)
Eighth sub-patch of the v1.4.x Polish Sweep series. First user-visible feature bundle since v1.4.5.
TempTell tabs can now be pinned via right-click; pinned tabs survive plugin reload and character
logout, keep their conversation history (loaded on demand from the message store on rehydrate), and
stay bound to the same /tell partner. A hard cap of 5 pinned tabs lives in a pool separate from
the 15-tab auto-tell pool, total ceiling 20. The sidebar groups pinned tabs into their own section
with a divider header, and the sidebar width itself is now configurable in Theme & Layout
between 44 and 160 px. Honorific glow outlines render when the title carries a Glow colour, opt-in
via Settings → Integrations → Render glow outlines (Honorific) (default off). Honorific's
gradient (Color3 / GradientColourSet / Wave / Pulse) is parsed but rendered statically — a later
cycle will port the full animation algorithm or land an upstream IPC PR for the resolved frame
colour. Configuration.UpdateFrom now preserves the runtime CurrentChannel across the
persistent-tab merge, and TabSwitched deep-clones the seeded channel instead of sharing the
previous tab's UsedChannel — together they fix a Settings-Save regression where the chat input
could pop back to /tell <pinned-partner> after touching settings on a Party or Linkshell tab.
Internal items: IPluginLogProxy indirection over Dalamud's IPluginLog routes all ~91
Plugin.Log call sites through a testable proxy, closing the F12.1 test-isolation gap
(MessageStore.Migrate0 runs in xUnit now). TempTab counter switched from Interlocked cached
field to derived Tabs.Count(predicate). Migration v16 → v17 is additive (new Tab.IsPinned flag).
Build-Suite floor 688 → 710 (+22 tests across Pin-lifecycle predicates, pool limits, Tab.Clone
roundtrip, MessageStore Migrate0 construction, and Honorific TitleData JSON roundtrip).
v1.4.6 — Code Hygiene and Refactor (released 2026-05-12)
Seventh sub-patch of the v1.4.x Polish Sweep series. Maintenance patch — no user-visible behaviour
changes; tightens the development feedback loop and pulls in two ChatTwo upstream bugfixes.
scripts/preflight.sh gains a csharpier reflow check (Block E) and a markdownlint pass (Block F),
so style drift and markdown violations are blocked at the pre-push gate.
FontManager.AddFontWithFallback catch-filter now spans InvalidOperationException and
ArgumentException on top of the existing IO triad, with the exception type name in the warning log
so the diagnostic path can see which atlas-toolkit throw triggered the fallback. BrandingLinks and
IntegrationLinks run a [ModuleInitializer] URL validation pass on plugin load; a typo in a
future URL rotation now throws at startup instead of failing silently when a user clicks the broken
button. Cherry-picked from ChatTwo upstream f35b7d3: Chat.SetChannel no longer leaks the native
Utf8String when the linkshell check rejects the channel (rename to IsChannelOrExistingLinkshell
plus wrap-not-return), and Tab.Clone now deep-clones UsedChannel and TellTarget (the previous
reference copy let PopOut and Temp tabs mutate each other's channel state). The ChatLogWindow
active-tab underline pill scales with ImGuiHelpers.GlobalScale and rounds to physical pixels for
crisp rendering above 100 % DPI. Internal items: HellionStyle ChildBgAlpha extracted to a testable
helper, Plugin.SaveConfig clones only the temp-tab subset in the snapshot path, SettingsOverview
caches the draw-list per frame, Dalamud.Utility.Util static surface routed through an
IPlatformUtil indirection (MessageStore's IsWine probe is now testable in isolation). No
schema bump, no migration.
v1.4.5 — UX and Robustness (released 2026-05-12)
Sixth sub-patch of the v1.4.x Polish Sweep series. User-visible robustness polish plus two doc/test
polish items from the audit backlog. Chat-log draw failures now surface as a one-shot notification
instead of failing silently. The first-run wizard splits accept from close: OnClose no longer
silently sets FirstRunCompleted, and a new footer "Later — keep defaults" button is the explicit
path to dismiss without picking a profile. InputHistoryService clears on plugin dispose so the
previous session's typed commands don't bleed into the next load. FontManager falls back to the
system font path if the embedded Hellion font resource is missing (broken-csproj / dev-build only).
The status bar hides the version slot when the chat window is too narrow to fit all five slots
without overlap. Plus Plugin.cs:167-168 gains an explicit session-only Auto-Tell-Tab invariant
comment with a TempTabCounter.InitFromList pin in the Build-Suite. No schema bump, no migration.
v1.4.4 — Threading and IPC Safety Polish (released 2026-05-12)
Fifth sub-patch of the v1.4.x Polish Sweep series. AutoTellTabsService.ActiveTempTabCount switches
from a lock-protected LINQ Count to an Interlocked counter kept in sync from inside the existing
mutation paths; Initialize() seeds from the persisted Tabs list and SaveConfig's
snapshot-restore path calls a new ResyncTempTabCounter() after the mid-step RemoveAll.
HonorificService carries per-method threading banners and TryUnsubscribe's log level moves from
Debug to Warning. AutoTranslate.PreloadCache is marked IsBackground = true so plugin unload no
longer waits for it. Configuration.IsAllowedForStorage logs once per unknown ChatType via a
NonSerialized HashSet, and PrivacyPersistUnknownChannels default flips to true for new
installs. No schema bump, no migration.
v1.4.3 — Plugin-Load Async-Init + Repo-Cutover (released 2026-05-08)
Fourth and largest sub-patch of the v1.4.x Polish Sweep series. Plugin migrated to Dalamud's
IAsyncDalamudPlugin API: the constructor handles only bootstrap essentials (config load, language
init, conflict detection); migrations, service allocations, window construction and hook
subscription move to LoadAsync. Schema gate replaces the v9 → v16 migration chain; configs on
schema v16+ load directly, older configs trigger an "install v1.4.2 first" error.
AutoTranslate.PreloadCache moved off the load path. FontManager.BuildFonts runs sync at the
start of LoadAsync; Dalamud rebuilds the font atlas on its own pipeline. Custom-repo URL cut over
to gitea.hellion-forge.cloud; the GitHub repo remains as a frozen v1.4.2 snapshot. Plugin load
time sits at ~3.7 s median (5 reloads), comparable to v1.4.2 — the async migration is a foundation
for v1.4.4 lazy-init optimisations rather than an immediate user-perceived win.
v1.4.2 — ChatLog Frame-Hot-Path (released 2026-05-08)
Third sub-patch of the v1.4.x Polish Sweep series. Per-frame allocations eliminated from the
ChatLogWindow render path and the settings status bar. Card-mode border loop in DrawMessages
hoists five invariants into a pre-loop hoist; AutoTellTabTint gets a per-tab cache via
TabTintCache (separate validation keys per cache, no cross-invalidation); status bar moves the
cache-gate check before the aggregation and replaces LINQ Sum+Count with a single-pass foreach.
v1.4.1 — Theme Engine Performance (released 2026-05-08)
Second sub-patch of the v1.4.x Polish Sweep series. ABGR cache pre-computed on theme records;
HellionStyle.PushGlobal reads from the cache instead of converting per slot per frame. ~13 %
render-time recovery in smoke tests (plan estimate of 2–6 % was conservative; real result ~10–15
%). Custom-theme hot-reload survives transient file locks via last-known-good snapshot. Plus:
Synthwave Sunset as the tenth built-in, author credits consolidated under Hellion Forge, Mint
Grove + Forge Merchantman credited to Carla Beleandis as a community thanks.
v1.4.0 — Critical Lifecycle Fixes (released 2026-05-07)
First sub-patch of the v1.4.x Polish Sweep series. Seven P0 findings from audit passes 3 and 4
resolved: async-void loads, missing IsBackground flags, GC.Collect in Dispose, deferred-save
race and pre-v13 backup lookup for WindowOpacity. No schema bumps, no user-facing behaviour
changes other than reload and shutdown running noticeably cleaner.
v1.3.0 — Plugin Integrations: Honorific (released 2026-05-07)
First cycle of the plugin integrations roadmap. Honorific custom titles displayed in the chat header with auto-detect and silent fallback. New Integrations settings tab. Pattern-setter for the five following cycles (Context Menu, NotificationMaster, RP Status Block, ExtraChat, XIVIM).
Spec: Plugin Integrations Overview
v1.2.3 — Theme Expansion (released 2026-05-06)
Four new built-in themes: Night Blue, Indigo Violet, Forge Merchantman, Hellion Spectrum
(Deuteran/Protan-safe). No engine changes. See docs/CHANGELOG.md.
(v1.2.2 was burned because the repo.json manifest was not bumped in sync on the first push —
re-released as v1.2.3 with full manifest synchronisation.)
v1.2.1 — Settings Cleanup (released 2026-05-06)
Settings re-sorted thematically (9 cards), 4 dead settings removed, auto-migration v15 → v16 without data loss.
v1.2.0 — Layout Refresh (released 2026-05-05)
Top tabs refresh, sidebar tab icons, bottom status bar, card rows as default message render, auto-tell tab hashing.
v1.1.0 — Theme Foundation (released 2026-05-05)
Theme engine with five built-in themes, settings card grid, custom themes via JSON, theme authoring
docs. Plugin icon updated to Hellion Forge hammer. See docs/CHANGELOG.md for details.
Items from the original v1.1.0 plan (ad-block / spam filter, receive-suppressed-tells toggle) were deferred in favour of the theme engine — both items live on in the mid-term block.
Mid-Term (v1.4.x+)
- Plugin Integrations Roadmap (Cycles 2–6) — six plugin integrations planned; Honorific (Cycle 1) is live, followed by Context Menu, NotificationMaster, RP Status Block, ExtraChat and XIVIM in their own cycles. Spec and cycle order in Plugin Integrations Overview.
- Ad-Block / Spam Filter — hybrid concept combining a lightweight built-in filter with optional
NoSolicitingIPC integration. Addresses ad-spam in public channels and tells. Deferred from the v1.1.0 plan. - Receive-Suppressed-Tells Toggle — auto-tell tabs trigger even when a third-party plugin (e.g. XIVMessenger) globally suppresses /tell display. Same hook layer as ad-block, so they are bundled.
- Database Viewer Inline Search — full-text search in the DB viewer via SQLite FTS5. Currently only date and channel filters are available.
- TempTell Persistence — pin toggle on TempTell tabs so selected tells survive a relog. Tester request from Jingliu.
- FontManager Async Refactor — move
LoadGameSymFontAsyncout of the blocking plugin constructor. Fix cold-start hitching on first plugin load (low severity; plugin is functional). - Separate Opacity Active vs. Inactive — second slider for inactive window opacity. Upstream declines this; we can decide differently here.
- Failed-Tell Notification — visible message on /tell failure (offline, restricted instance, blacklisted, world-mismatch) instead of silent failure.
- Per-Tab Sound Notification — sound toggle and optionally a custom .wav per tab, with mute-in-combat option.
Long-Term (v1.x+)
Storage Backends (three-stage confirmation)
- MySQL/MariaDB backend for multi-device setups
- PostgreSQL backend
- AES-256 encryption for sensitive channels with a local key
Linux-Specific
- WireGuard network detection as an optional filter trigger
- libnotify integration for native Linux toasts
- XDG compliance (complex under Wine)
UX and Tab Management
- Regex Tab Routing — route plugin output spam into dedicated tabs, auto-sort tells from specific people. Clearly scoped against ad-block: routing sorts into views, blocking hides globally.
Auto-Detect Duties— dropped in v1.5.6 cycle: the effort (a render-gate in the tab-bar / tab-sidebar draw plus resolving what happens to the active tab when it is hidden) outweighs the practical benefit. Removed from backlog.- UX Bundle — vertical tab bar as a layout option, Shift+Mousewheel to scroll tab headers without activating them, global hotkey to close the active tab.
- Configure Tab Title — configurable tab title format (name / name + abbreviated world / full name / custom), overridable per tab.
- Name Display Options — analogous to FFXIV vanilla (full name, first name abbreviated, initials), per-channel override possible.
- Item & Flag Linking — outgoing: Shift-click on an item/flag sends it to the focused plugin input. Incoming: item links and map coordinates are clickable.
- Color Currently Selected Input Channel — tint the channel-selector button in the input bar with the current channel colour.
- Plugin-Disclosure Pre-Send Filter — configurable word/regex list blocks sending with a pre-send confirmation. Protects against accidentally mentioning plugins in public channels.
Chat Clear on Name Change— dropped in v1.5.6 cycle: would require tracking the character against a stored prior state, which conflicts with the privacy-plugin identity; the desired effect already exists because HellionChat keeps history per character identity, so there is no functional gap. Removed from backlog.- Hide Plugin Window on NG+ Screen — extend hide logic to cover additional addon names.
Kick from Novice Network— dropped in v1.5.6 cycle: no accessible IPC surface found for Novice Network membership check or kick action; not feasible without a risky memory scan. Removed from backlog.- Text-to-Speech for /tell — incoming tells via TTS, optionally per sender, with channel filter and mute-in-combat. Low priority.
Distribution and Branding
- Hand-drawn Hellion logo (currently a placeholder from the Hellion Online Media brand repo)
- GitHub Action for automatic
repo.jsonsync after tag push - Submission to the Dalamud main plugin repository (in addition to the custom repo)
Bug Verifications
Carried over from the upstream issue tracker; not yet reproduced or verified in Hellion Chat 1.0.0. Will be tested against the current state when opportunity allows.
- Right-Click Whisper Error in Field Ops / Special Instances (Eureka, Bozja, Occult Crescent,
DRS) — upstream #168. Reply helper appears to
swallow the
@Worldsuffix. - FPS Drops with Plugin Active — upstream #145. 10–20 % drop since upstream v1.29.19.0. v1.0.0 includes several fixes on the suspected paths; repro test against the current state is open.
- Add Blacklist from Plugin Window — upstream #140. Right-click add-to-blacklist throws "Cannot locate character with that name"; works via vanilla chat.
- DB Viewer Column Sort — State column sorts lexicographically instead of numerically (10 before 2). XIVIM #82; repro in Hellion Chat open.
Licence Boundary
Hellion Chat is licensed under EUPL-1.2. Concept imports from AGPL-3.0 plugins (e.g. XIV Instant
Messenger) are architectural inspiration only — no code was ported. Code imports from the upstream
codebase are complete as of v1.4.x because Chat 2 is undergoing a fundamental rework and selective
patches are no longer cleanly portable. Status and rationale in
UPSTREAM_SYNC.md.