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Desktop GUI

An optional FLTK window, off by default. It configures and runs the embedded server and shows its log; solving belongs to the API and to the web UI the server serves at its root, which the window's Open web UI button opens in your browser.

Two tabs:

  • Server - status, bind address, port, index directory, cache budget and solve timeout, with Start, Stop and Open web UI. Changing the port or the address rebinds the listener in place; the loaded index files stay in memory, so a restart is instant.
  • Logs - the same tracing output the headless binary prints, read-only.

Minimising the window puts it in the notification area (Windows only so far) and leaves the server running. Click the icon, or its Open Faint Light item, to bring the window back; Exit quits.

Building it

cargo build --release -p fl-server --features gui

FLTK is compiled from source, which needs CMake 3.28 or newer and a C++ toolchain: MSVC on Windows, gcc or clang plus the X11 (or Wayland) development headers on Linux. --features gui-bundled links prebuilt FLTK binaries instead, for the targets fltk-rs publishes them for.

Where it keeps things

What Where
Settings %APPDATA%\faint_light\gui.json, or ~/.config/faint_light/gui.json
Log faint-light.log, in the same directory
Start at login HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run, or ~/.config/autostart/faint-light.desktop

Environment variables supply the defaults for the settings file, and the window writes it when you press Start or close the window. Anything the window does not expose - the pixel-scale prior, FAINT_LIGHT_FAKE - keeps coming from the environment.

The Logs tab is backed by the log file, so it still shows what happened in previous runs. Clear empties the tab and the file together; nothing else discards history.

"Start Faint Light when Windows starts" is not kept in the settings file. The platform's own autostart entry is the source of truth, so the checkbox always agrees with what the system will actually do.

The headless server reads no file at all: environment variables are its only configuration.

Why two executables

faint-light and faint-light-gui are deliberately separate. A Windows GUI has to be linked into the windows subsystem or it opens a console window behind itself, while the headless server has to stay a console program so Ctrl-C, redirected output and service wrappers work. That is a link-time choice, so one executable cannot be both.

Keeping them apart also keeps FLTK, CMake and a C++ toolchain out of the server build, which is what lets the container image stay small.