ghostty-rs/docs/rewrite/AGENT_GUIDE.md

Guide for porting agents

You are porting part of Ghostty 1.3.1 (Zig) to Rust. Read docs/rewrite/ARCHITECTURE.md first.

• Zig source (read-only reference): ../../../ghostty/src
• Rust workspace: ../..

Rules

1. Stay in your lane. Only edit the crate/modules assigned to you. If you need something from another crate that doesn't exist yet, write a minimal local version, mark it // TODO(integration): ..., and mention it in your report. Never rewrite other agents' modules. You MAY add dependencies to your own crate's Cargo.toml (prefer well-known crates; use cargo add -p <crate>).
2. Faithful port — except genuine bugs. If the Zig code has a real memory-safety bug or undefined behaviour (use-after-free, out-of-bounds, leaks, stale pointers, infinite loops, integer overflow UB), do NOT replicate it: implement the evidently intended, safe behaviour, add a test, and record it under "Upstream bugs fixed" in your notes (Zig file:line, what was wrong, what the Rust does). Everything else stays faithful. Original rule 2: Faithful port. Preserve behaviour, edge cases, defaults and naming (snake_case of the Zig names). Port doc comments (they are user-visible for config/actions). Don't "improve" semantics. Idiomatic Rust structure is fine (enums for tagged unions, traits for comptime interfaces, Result for error unions) as long as behaviour matches.
3. Port the tests. Every Zig test "name" in files you port becomes a #[test] fn name_snake_case() in a #[cfg(test)] mod tests of the corresponding Rust module. Tests that are about Zig-only concerns (allocator failure injection, comptime, C ABI, Metal/macOS) may be skipped — list them in your notes file. Add extra tests when behaviour is subtle.
4. No unsafe unless your crate is explicitly allowed (renderer, termio, apprt-gtk), and then only minimal + // SAFETY: comments.
5. Quality gate before you finish (must all pass for your crate):
   • cargo build -p <crate>
   • cargo test -p <crate>
   • cargo clippy -p <crate> --all-targets -- -D warnings
   • cargo fmt -p <crate> (rustfmt.toml in repo root; if nightly-only options warn, ignore the warnings) No todo!()/unimplemented!() left in code paths that are reachable, unless documented in your notes as deferred.
6. Do NOT run git commit or any git command that changes state. The orchestrator commits.
7. Other agents work concurrently in other crates of the same workspace. If the workspace build breaks because of another crate, use -p <crate> and ignore it. Cargo may block briefly on the build-directory lock; that's normal.
8. Write notes to docs/rewrite/notes/<crate>-<topic>.md: what was ported (file → module), skipped tests with reasons, deviations, TODO(integration) items, known gaps.
9. Final report (your last message): ≤ 25 lines — modules done, test counts (ported / skipped), quality-gate status, open issues. The orchestrator reads only this, so be precise and honest about anything incomplete.

Conventions

• pub mod per Zig file; file names snake_case (PageList.zig → page_list.rs).
• Error types: thiserror is fine; anyhow only in binaries/CLI.
• Logging: the log crate (log::warn! etc.) where Zig uses std.log.
• Integer types: keep the Zig widths (u16 for cell counts CellCountInt, etc.).
• Zig packed struct bitfields → plain structs unless memory layout matters (documented in ARCHITECTURE for Cell/Row).
• Prefer std collections; hashbrown/smallvec/bitflags OK.