Hacktoberfest 2026: the issues maintainers tagged for October, open and beginner-friendly. Browse Hacktoberfest issues

launcher: agterm overlay always covers the whole session; allow a floating panel size

Closed Beginner friendly
#401 0 comments 0 reactions 0 assignees View on GitHub

Maintainers usually reply within 1 day

A pull request for this has already been merged.

  • #404 by @umputun — merged

Assessment

Difficulty
2/5
Estimated time
1-3 hours
Newbie friendliness
83/100
Issue type
Feature
Clarity
Clearly specified
Activity status
Active
Tech stack
go, shell

Research direction

Start with .claude-plugin/skills/revdiff/scripts/launch-revdiff.sh and plugins/codex/skills/revdiff/scripts/launch-revdiff.sh, then compare how each builds session-wide and pane-scoped agterm overlay commands. Update both launcher copies and the listed configuration docs; app/plugin_exit_code_test.go is the suggested test entry point. Done when the optional size setting reaches session-wide overlays and unset behavior remains unchanged.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Description

What is the problem?

In agterm the launcher always runs agtermctl session overlay open "$REVDIFF_CMD" --block with no --size-percent, so revdiff covers the whole agent session. While the review is open I cannot see the agent's chat: its last reply, the question it asked, or the context of the change I am annotating. To read it I have to close revdiff and open it again. REVDIFF_POPUP_WIDTH / REVDIFF_POPUP_HEIGHT work for tmux, zellij and wezterm, but the agterm branch ignores them, and REVDIFF_AGTERM_PANE=1 scopes the overlay to the agent's own pane, which still hides the chat.

How does this solve it?

agterm already supports a floating overlay: agtermctl session overlay open <cmd> --size-percent N. At 70% the chat stays visible around the panel, and on my window revdiff still gets ~190 columns, enough for a 120-character code line with the file tree and line numbers. Only the agterm branch needs a change: append --size-percent "$REVDIFF_AGTERM_SIZE_PERCENT" to the session-wide overlay open when the variable is set (not to the --pane open, which agterm does not combine with --size-percent). Unset keeps today's full-session overlay, so nothing changes for current users.

Size of the change: two lines in each launcher copy (.claude-plugin/skills/revdiff/scripts/launch-revdiff.sh and plugins/codex/skills/revdiff/scripts/launch-revdiff.sh). One line appends --size-percent to AGTERM_OPEN when the open is not pane-scoped. The other adds it to the session-wide fallback open after a refused pane overlay. The rest is one line per place that documents REVDIFF_AGTERM_PANE today (README, both SKILL.md and references/config.md, site/docs.html), plus a case in app/plugin_exit_code_test.go if you want it covered.

Proposed name: REVDIFF_AGTERM_SIZE_PERCENT (an integer percent), next to the existing REVDIFF_AGTERM_PANE. Reusing REVDIFF_POPUP_WIDTH would also work, but its values are tmux-style (90%, columns) and agterm takes one percent for both axes, so a separate variable seems clearer.

Today I get this with a user-layer launch-revdiff.sh override that puts an agtermctl shim first on PATH and appends --size-percent ${REVDIFF_AGTERM_SIZE_PERCENT:-70}. With the variable in the launcher, the shim goes away. I can send the PR if this fits.

Dominant language
Go
Stars
928
Forks
96
Avg merge
2d 3h
Merged PRs (30d)
28

Getting set up

First steps

  1. Read the whole issue, then the project's contributing guide.
  2. Comment on the issue to say you are picking it up — it saves two people doing the same work.
  3. Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
  4. Open a pull request that references the issue number.

More from umputun/revdiff

All issues in umputun/revdiff

Similar issues

More Go issues

Get new issues in your inbox

A short digest of beginner-friendly GitHub issues.