# Ratty Architecture
This document outlines the high-level architecture for the Ratty terminal emulator.
## Core Components
### Terminal (src/terminal.rs)
The central component that manages the terminal state, processes input, and coordinates between other components. It handles the main event loop and lifecycle of the application.
### Renderer (src/renderer.rs)
Responsible for rendering the terminal content to the screen. This will eventually support GPU acceleration and various rendering options.
### Config (src/config.rs)
Manages user configuration, including themes, fonts, and terminal settings. Provides loading and saving functionality.
### Platform (src/platform/)
Contains platform-specific code isolated in separate modules to minimize platform dependencies while enabling platform-specific optimizations.
## Architecture Principles
1. **Platform Abstraction**: All platform-specific code is isolated in the `platform` module, with a common interface that allows the rest of the application to be platform-agnostic.
2. **Modular Design**: Each major component is separated into its own module with clear responsibilities and well-defined interfaces.
3. **Workspace Organization**: As the project grows, we'll use Cargo workspaces to organize platform-specific code and optional features.
4. **Standards Compliance**: The terminal will adhere to common terminal standards and protocols to ensure compatibility with existing applications.
## Future Considerations
- **Multi-window Support**: The architecture will be extended to support multiple windows and tabs.
- **Plugin System**: Potential for a plugin architecture to allow for extensibility.
- **Protocol Implementations**: Support for various terminal protocols (iTerm2, Kitty, etc.).
- **Rendering Options**: Different rendering backends for performance and compatibility.
## Development Workflow
1. Start with basic terminal functionality working on all supported platforms.
2. Incrementally add features according to the priority list in project-goals.md.
3. Maintain clean separation between core functionality and platform-specific code.
4. Ensure comprehensive testing on all supported platforms.