Tether 0.5.0

Tether 0.5.0

Released 2026-10-25

Highlights

• Tether runs on macOS 14.4 (Sonoma) and later, on Apple silicon and Intel Macs (the download holds both). macOS 26 keeps its Liquid Glass look; earlier systems get the standard one.
• Very long sessions take much less space: while a session runs, its earlier output is compressed in pieces, and scrolling back still feels the same. One busy session can no longer push every other recording out when space runs out.

New

• Search and plain-text export show what the terminal showed: full-screen programs (vim, less, htop) no longer fill them with their screens, progress bars and spinners give their final line, and programs that redraw everything (Claude Code) appear once instead of once per redraw.
• Settings ▸ Terminal ▸ Programs may clear the scrollback (off by default): off, clear and programs that redraw everything clear the screen but never the history above it. The recording keeps everything either way.
• With encryption on, output and command history are kept while Tether is locked too: they are sealed to the public half of the recording key, and only unlocking opens them. Before, nothing was recorded while locked, and command history recorded then was lost at quit.
• Recordings note the terminal's size, so transcripts replay at the width they were shown.
• Tabs running Claude Code, Codex or opencode (in tmux) are named after the agent's session, unless you renamed them (Settings ▸ General ▸ Tabs & Windows ▸ Name tabs after coding agent sessions). The sidebar then shows whether the agent is working.
• Browse (⇧⌘O) in a terminal of this Mac opens its folder in Finder (Settings ▸ General ▸ Tabs & Windows ▸ Browse folders of this Mac in Finder; off, Tether's file manager as before). Hosts keep using the file manager.
• Every table of the host panel exports as CSV: processes, listening ports, logged-in users, TCP connections, services, containers, Kubernetes pods and GPUs.
• A middle click on a terminal or file tab in the sidebar closes it, like its close button (as in the tab bar).
• Settings ▸ Recordings ▸ Compress long sessions while they run (every 16 MB by default, or never). The latest output stays as it is, so scrolling back stays fast.
• Settings ▸ Recordings ▸ When space runs out, shorten the largest session first (on by default): a session holding more than half of the storage limit loses its oldest output before any other recording is removed. This works for sessions kept in parts (not with compression while running set to Never).
• The command history exports as three tables: one row per command (now with the hosts it connected to and the programs it ran), one row per process, and one row per connection (remote address, host, port, service, bytes and peak speed). The JSON export names every field with its unit and includes processes, connections and the graph.
• Exported connections and traffic by process include the remote host, port and service, and the bytes moved.

Improved

• Search finds the history of a session while a full-screen program (vim, less) is open in it, not only that program's screen.
• Where a session's recording meets what the terminal still holds is found by content, so search neither repeats nor skips lines there (when it cannot be sure, a line may show twice; none is left out). Save Session takes plain text from the recording, so a Claude Code session is saved without its redraws.
• A clear that arrives cut in two by the network is still seen whole, so it can never erase the history on screen.
• Scrolling back past memory in a session that redraws a lot reads further instead of stopping, and a replayed clear no longer erases the history it loads.
• Scrolling back reads at most 16 MB of a recording at a time and brings at most 250,000 lines into memory, so output with few line breaks (full-screen programs, progress bars) never fills memory.
• When writing a recording fails (the disk is full), recording goes on once there is space again, and the recording says how much output is missing.
• Folders and connection logs left in /tmp by earlier runs are removed after a day.

Fixed

• After reopening Tether, full-screen programs (Claude Code, vim) in tabs that were restored in the background fit the window when the tab is shown, without resizing the window by hand.
• Starting Tether a second time (for example a copy in another folder) brings the running one to the front instead of running twice; two copies at once could remove each other's open recordings and break password prompts.
• Turning encryption on or off no longer runs at the same time as the regular maintenance of recordings.
• Copies of remote files made for Quick Look and dragging are removed after a day.
• Exporting search results reports a failure instead of silently writing nothing, and never leaves half a file.
• Closing a tab that was restored at launch, or opened to attach to a server session, while it was still connecting no longer ends that tmux or screen session on the server.
• Deleting an archived session also deletes its recording when the recording was compressed.
• A cancelled or failed copy (scp) no longer leaves a partial file behind under a normal name.
• Command history that could not be saved (a full disk) is written again later instead of only at the next change.
• After the Tether password is reset, encrypted command history files that can no longer be opened are removed, and new history is saved again.
• A damaged settings-like file (hosts, archive, open sessions, windows) is kept aside as name.unreadable-<date>.json instead of being overwritten.
• An encrypted recording reopened after a crash keeps everything written afterwards readable.
• Playing back the start of a compressed recording showed its end.

Notes

• tmux or screen started by hand inside a tab use the alternate screen, so search and plain-text export treat them like a full-screen program (their output is in the transcript and the raw recording). Tether's own tmux and screen sessions are not affected.
• Changed default: Browse in a terminal of this Mac opens Finder; turn off Settings ▸ General ▸ Tabs & Windows ▸ Browse folders of this Mac in Finder for Tether's file manager.
• Recording while locked starts after the first unlock with this version (that is when the key's public half is saved).
• Requires macOS 14.4 or later (was macOS 26). Building from source is tested with Xcode 26; make install builds for the Mac it runs on, make zip for Apple silicon and Intel.
• A second Tether started with the same data folder now shows the running one instead (test and demo runs keep their own folders).
• What Tether keeps on this Mac, where, for how long and what goes first is described in docs/data-storage.md.
• Recordings of long sessions made before this version are not split into parts; only their size counts.