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Module proc

Module proc 

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Spawning child processes without putting a window on the operator’s screen.

Every external program magi runs - the agent CLIs, git, gh, the configured verification commands - is a console application. What happens when one is spawned depends on whether the parent has a console, and magi has two kinds of parent:

  • magi run / magi review in a terminal. The child inherits that console, writes nowhere visible because its pipes are redirected, and nothing appears.
  • magi web, which serves the deck. Its successor is spawned DETACHED_PROCESS on purpose (see crate::web): it has to outlive the process that started it and must not hold a pipe a terminal is waiting on. That process has no console at all, so Windows allocates a brand new one for each console child - and draws it. An implement wave is three agents, so three black windows opened over whatever the operator was doing, in front of the browser they were reading the deck in.

CREATE_NO_WINDOW is the answer to exactly that: the child still gets a console for its standard handles, and that console is never shown. It is not the same as DETACHED_PROCESS, which gives the child no console and would make a grandchild pop a window of its own for the same reason.

Nothing here is conditional on how magi was started. A hidden console is correct in a terminal too: the pipes are redirected either way, so there was never anything to look at.

Traits§

Quiet
Spawn without a visible console window.