Hydra-OS/docs/releases/2026-10-13-terminal-ux/README.md

Hydra OS terminal UX preview

Source revision: 1bc7965ccaddb76abc78aafa82bb59358cf4dc0e.

Changes

• Terminal VM menu accepts a number, name, or the remembered selection. Opening a stopped guest starts it explicitly; opening a live guest reconnects its screen. The selected VM receives the initial workspace after refresh, while other QEMU processes continue independently.
• hydra run URL --name NAME downloads an ISO, creates a new guest and opens it. hydra open NAME reopens it; hydra download URL only downloads. Guided creation honors the same --defaults as direct CLI creation.
• Downloads show progress, support cancellation and optional publisher SHA-256, validate ISO9660 declared extents, and preserve existing files/profiles. Pure UDF images are explicitly unsupported by this initial downloader; ISO9660/UDF hybrids are accepted through ISO9660 validation. A format check does not establish publisher authenticity or arbitrary guest OS bootability.
• Visible system, boot, installer and viewer labels use Hydra OS. Fastfetch includes an original three-headed text logo and a concise host summary.
• A separate self-contained developer update bundle supports dry-run, exact checksums, backups and best-effort exception rollback. It does not replace guest disks, profiles, kernel or networking.

Verification

• Complete source suite: 293 tests passed, 44.788 seconds.
• Private two-guest focus probe: selecting Beta opens workspace 2; fresh keyboard focus, unchanged PID/UUID and continuing hidden counters survive refresh and compositor exit.
• Private general graphics/input smoke: reserved switching while keybindings are inhibited, manual USB selector without automatic attachment, view reconnection and media lifecycle passed. Requested display mode is 1920×1080 at 144000 mHz; physical refresh/input behavior is not inferred from that request.
• Independent task and final branch reviews completed; ISO extent validation, partial rollback reporting, shortcut help and custom menu defaults findings were resolved. No open review findings remain.
• The final full update zipapp was exercised against a disposable installed-root fixture: dry-run, apply, all installed hashes, retained original metadata and relocated CLI passed. The existing user installation has not been updated.

Rebuilt ISO boot/install acceptance: all 13 checks passed. The complete report identifies the exact ISO and firmware. It includes real installation, ISO-free boot, password login, persistent data, the packaged terminal UX and Fastfetch, routed LAN-to-VM TCP, nested KVM, VM/socket survival through actual logout and normal shutdown. No check was skipped. The Fastfetch capture comes from the installed test guest's default configuration.

The previous preview record at ../2026-10-13/ describes only the earlier ISO and is unchanged.

Delivery and decisions

ISO: hydra-os.iso, 2,345,932,800 bytes. SHA-256:

1ed2cc79482ac5b14794ed6d4c4caf46ecc54af6457c5d38bc662cd3c104fbad

Runtime update: hydra-os-update-1bc7965.pyz, 56,425 bytes. SHA-256:

3ed9288451894277797aa34f105f1969af0a892b1ec14dc27b1fadeed2a7e7f3

See terminal usage for applying it inside an installed Hydra guest, logging out and in again, installing Fastfetch on older images, and manually reversing an update. The bundle includes Fastfetch configuration/artwork, not its executable package.

The derivative OS identity is ID=hydra-os, ID_LIKE=gentoo; vendor /usr/lib/os-release remains intact. Consumers matching only ID=gentoo need to consider ID_LIKE. Technical hostname, bridge, storage paths and EFI bootloader identifier remain compatible.

The downloader deliberately rejects pure UDF because it cannot verify its declared extent with the implemented validator. Such media needs a supported alternative or a separate manual download/lower-level workflow. Publisher hashes remain advisable for whole-image integrity.

Physical ASUS graphics, touchpad, brightness keys, Wi-Fi, suspend, audio playback and actual USB-device redirection remain hardware checks. The updater is a trusted-source developer tool with backups, not a signed package manager or a guarantee of multi-file atomicity across power loss. No command channel into the existing manual test VM was available; staged delivery evidence does not mean that VM was updated.