#50 feat(tui): add an External llama.cpp pane to the LLM tab

[Anonymous]

Originally created by: sachin-detrax

Closes [#49].

What

Adds external as a third pane of the LLM tab, cycled with ←/→:

Mode: Local | Cloud | External llama.cpp
Press ←/→ to switch mode

External llama.cpp
> base URL http://127.0.0.1:8080 [not active] · Enter: point the chat route at an external llama.cpp

  managed daemon: running pid 42 on 127.0.0.1:19091 · s start/stop
  ← Local pane: pick a managed model to switch back

The pane is a single row because an external llama-server is one base URL. Enter opens an inline editor seeded with the current URL; saving it runs the existing /health probe and only then persists localModels.url + mode: "external", so an unreachable address never steals a working route. A scheme-less host gets http:// prepended; unparseable input keeps the editor open behind an invalid URL hint rather than closing and silently discarding the edit.

Once the route is live the row reads * base URL http://192.168.1.50:8080 [ok · 12ms] and the status line switches to mode external · <url>.

Going back to managed is unchanged: pick a model in the Local pane, which already persists mode: "managed".

Fixes in the persist path

Both are shared with /models <base-url>, which had the same defects:

• Point the chat route at local-llama when a cloud provider is active, so the saved URL is not inert. Skipped when the route is already local, so editing a URL does not emit a spurious "Switched active text provider" line.
• Call localModels.refresh() so the panel stops reporting managed mode.

Both run after the probe succeeds, so a failed switch changes nothing.

Managed daemon teardown

Switching to external now stops the managed chat daemon, which would otherwise hold its VRAM for a route nothing uses. stopChatDaemonOnly() deliberately leaves the embedding daemon and memory.embeddings.enabled alone — unlike the cloud path's stopDaemon(), which stops both and turns hybrid recall off. It no-ops when nothing is running.

Skipped when the new URL is the managed daemon's own loopback address: driving a daemon started with atomic-agent models start is a supported setup, and stopping it would kill the server just pointed at. pointsAtManagedDaemon(url, port) takes the port as an argument so it stays pure and testable.

Implementation notes

• LlmPanelMode gains external; the two cursor fields become three behind cursorFieldFor(mode), replacing the mode === "cloud" ? … : … branches in the reducer, selectors, and key bindings.
• ←/→ now carry a direction (switchLlmMode(state, dispatch, delta)); with three panes a plain toggle no longer works.
• The URL editor is a modal in handleLlmModalKey, so panel hotkeys (s, n, c, /) go into the buffer while it is open.
• parseExternalUrl is shared between the Enter guard and the modal renderer so the hint and the guard cannot disagree.

Testing

• src/tui/llm-panel/llm-panel-external.test.ts — 10 tests: pane cycling in both directions, row active/inactive state, editor open/type/backspace/save/cancel, scheme-less normalization, the unparseable-input guard, per-pane cursors.
• pointsAtManagedDaemon covered in src/tui/persist-user-local-models-config.test.ts (loopback spellings, other ports, other hosts, garbage input).
• Verified by rendering the real panel through the real key handler end to end (throwaway harness): the frames above are actual output, and onPersistLlamaUrl(http://192.168.1.50:8080) fired from typing 192.168.1.50:8080.
• tsc --noEmit clean, npm run build succeeds.
• src/tui: 656 passed / 6 failed, the same 6 that fail on main (splash-banner copy, chat-log, persist-embedding, two TuiApp smoke tests, one llm-panel selectors test). One of them, TuiApp (smoke) > shows the two-mode LLM panel, asserts header copy this PR changes — the assertion is updated, but the test still fails for its pre-existing reason (the test terminal is too short to render the full header, so it takes the compact path). Not fixed here.

Not included

• A /models external slash subcommand.
• Making bare /models land on the External pane when it is the active route. resolveModeFromActiveRoute would need configMode, which is still at its default until the first refresh — managed users would land on the wrong pane at startup.

[Anonymous]

Ticket changed by: Ooooze

• status: open --> closed