18.7 (TestFlight)

[carloscabanero]

The 18.7 series introduces three major refactors to core parts of the app. This push is the first of them. Behavior shouldn't change, but overall performance and predictability should improve significantly. These changes also lay the foundation for the main features in the next Blink.

I've tested thoroughly, but the workflows can get really complex — so your help catching edge cases is much appreciated.

What's changed.

• This is the first time in 10 years (!!) that Blink won't preserve your sessions between updates. This is due to the new format for Payloads. Please, make sure to kill previous mosh-server sessions on your remote.
• The layout hierarchy has been upgraded and reorganized. Big time.
• Payloads. This is an internal concept in Blink. Before we were just running sessions inside Blink. But now we run Payloads that can contain different sessions. This makes the launch process more predictable. And, this also opens the path for a new set of commands in Blink.

Fixes included

• Blank terminal requiring Enter to redraw.
  • Blink not blink while start the app #1310
• Cover / Fit / Fill layout issues.
  • The Cover should now properly cover also the full bottom of the terminal (thanks to @alexdilley for his good eye on Cover layout does not fully cover bottom area / leaves unused gap #2175).
  • Fill is now using a better heuristic. It will only be available on iPad as with the notch, Fill does not make sense on iPhone.
  • On iPad, the heuristic should behave better on "windowed" vs full screen vs external screen.
• Software keyboard layout issues.
  • Bug: black space between keyboard and terminal contents #2181
• Mosh occasionally needing a tab switch to resume (Mosh restore stucked until returning to tab #2176)

Please watch for:

• Layout glitches
• Software keyboard placement
• Focus and input loss
• App loading — especially Mosh restore and blank shells on resume.
• Issues in external displays, projections, etc...
• Issues with Code.

Report anything suspicious. Repeat. Report anything suspicious.

Thanks for testing!

[mistakenideas]

Mosh sessions which were active prior to the app update aren’t restored. Pretty sure they were over previous app updates? Understandable if they’re not with a refactor like this but since you said report anything suspicious.

[carloscabanero]

Yes, thank you for bringing this up. I missed to mention this. I actually gave a heads up on Discord to get feedback on what the best way to communicate this would be, and then I forgot to do it (!!). This is the first time that we won't be able to restore previous sessions due to the new format. But it will be worth it. Just added it to the notes here.

[mistakenideas]

Thanks Carlos, useful to know I wasn’t imaging things!

A couple more minor observations so far, I’ll try to get more detail if any are importantor reoccur, some may be linked to corner cases with layout changes

• the font size/resolution appears to resetting at times for some reason, within a session
• has the touch input improved? I’ve noticed I can do more in tmux (selecting panes, etc as if with a mouse pointer) than I thought I used to be able to
• possible side effect of the above is I found when focus was returning to Blink from another app, a tmux session seemed to be getting sent rogue inputs and was going into scroll/copy mode so I would need to escape out of this. I was using an external keyboard and haven’t been able to reproduce though
• I saw one rogue mosh session hang, again it hasn’t happened again and didn’t really cause any problems beyond it dying (I just fired up another and killed the original)

[carloscabanero]

• Will investigate the font size reset. I suspect a part of the app got suspended and maybe missed something reapplying the state.
• No, input should still be the same. The input focus flow and the layout has improved though. On cover, for example now we use more of the screen and maybe that's how you ended up tapping the tmux bar.
• I haven't experienced this but please keep an eye on it.
• Please keep an eye on this as well. If this happens again, try to create a new tab and go back to the "stuck" mosh. In the previous version, doing that would unstuck it, but this should not happen on this one.

Thanks a bunch for the notes!

[carloscabanero]

v18.7.0 build 2015

• Updated to LibSSH v0.12.0 & OpenSSL 3.0. This fixes and new features. Specially, support for Post-Quantum Crypto Key exchange mechanisms. This was a big change internally, all our tests are passing but make sure your workflows are still working! Update LibSSH #2171, Roadmap for post-quantum `ssh` client #2037, Support PCQ for SSH #2167.

• Layout improvements. The new Layout manager now also does better calculations for the Fit and Fill modes. On iPhone, I have disabled the "Fill" mode and will now default to Cover, as it does not make sense for the device.

• Status Bar. As part of the previous Layout improvements, the Fit mode will now also include the Status Bar. Thanks to @Lyapsus for the idea here. Show status bar in Fit mode #2240

• Removed x-callback-url methods. We have a new setup for Commands, and we will see a lot of features new improvements here. If you need a specific workflow to connect Blink to the rest of the system, please let us know!

• Important: mosh1 and ssh2 commands, which depended on Libssh2, were deprecate and are now removed.

Note: If the LibSSH update somehow blocks your workflow, please let us know and rollback to the previous build.

Thanks again for the help!

[wariuccio]

Hello, I spotted a regression with the latest update.

I have a setup where I forward my ssh agent to the server. The agent forwards the secure enclave key and I then use it to access some github private repository.
This used to work but after I updated whenever I do any git push/pull on a private repo Blink hangs.

[carloscabanero]

Thanks! The fix should be on next build

[tobyh]

ssh ProxyJump broke for me with 18.7. The following command used to work okay, and still works in a regular terminal

blink> ssh -vvv ruth -J gateway
Setting up connection callbacks.
Starting connection to ruth
ssh_connect: libssh 0.12.0 (c) 2003-2026 Aris Adamantiadis, Andreas Schneider and
libssh contributors. Distributed under the LGPL, please refer to COPYING file for
information about your rights, using threading threads_pthread
ssh_socket_connect_proxycommand: Executing proxycommand 'exec ssh -W '[ruth]:53545
' gateway'
ssh_socket_connect_proxycommand: ProxyCommand connection pipe: [80,81]
ssh_client_connection_callback: session_state=2
ssh_connect: Socket connecting, now waiting for the callbacks to work
ssh_connect: current state : 2
ssh_socket_exception_callback: Socket exception callback: 1 (0)
ssh_client_connection_callback: session_state=9
connError(msg: "Session Exception - Socket error: disconnected")
ssh_client_connection_callback: Socket error: disconnected
Starting connection to ruth
ssh_connect: current state : 9
Error connecting to ruth. connError(msg: "Socket error: disconnected")
SSH Session deinit

[alsacefan]

Seeing the same issue with ProxyCmd (using nc to connect via an HTTP CONNECT proxy). Log trace is almost identical. This is the primary server that I ssh into, so I have had to reinstall the earlier version.

[carloscabanero]

Thanks! Fix should be on next build.

[carloscabanero]

v18.7.0 build 2017

• SSH SetEnv — SetEnv is now supported in SSH config and on the command line (with properkey=value parsing).
• hterm updates — caret rendering and DSR 5 fixes.
• Cursor blink — blinking cursor state would not be preserved between restarts. Cursor Blink off, but Blink’s cursor blinks #2248
• Pragmata fallback for missing glyphs — Pragmata Pro Mono is used as the fallback for symbols missing from your selected font. Should resolve the symbol issues reported in U+23FA (⏺) ambiguous-width character causes cursor misalignment in Claude Code UI #2232.
• LibSSH v0.12 fixes — ProxyCommand, SOCKS, agent forwarding, and tunnels are all working again. Our QA tests are passing, so we feel pretty confident about this build. Please let us know if you run into any other issues connecting to your machines.
• Lockdown mode — follow-up to the 2207 fix, which was incomplete. Lockdown now consistently filters out non-bundled resources (custom fonts and themes).
• Focus regression on 18.7 — fixed. When Blink was side-by-side with another app, moving focus to the other app would cause Blink to grab it back unless a text field was capturing it.
• Paste on wrong terminal — Fixed. When creating a new window, pasting sometimes would go to the previous scene.
• Layout modes — final adjustments — safe-area handling reworked: Fit now respects the status bar at all times, and Fill produces a cleaner frame.
• Layout selection from the context menu — the menu now reflects the active layout (the change was being applied but the checkmark wasn't updating).

[tobyh]

v18.7.0.2019, iPadOS 26.5
Cursor Blink: off
Layout Mode: Safe Fit

When I app switch back to blink after a while in another app, the cursor is blinking and the layout is… not safe.

[mistakenideas]

The main issue I’ve seen with this build is a couple of crashes (in app reports sent) although I don’t have clear steps to repro hopefully the reports/callstacks show something of use.

[carloscabanero]

I have the crash reports. There is one more build with more changes under the hood coming up. These issues will be solved there.

[sundebug]

Where could I get the testflight version? I hand send a email but not received any response. I can't use the twitter . Is there any other method I could get the test version?

[carloscabanero]

I'm all caught up with my email and didn't get anything. If you join us on Discord and text me, we can sort you out there.

[carloscabanero]

Blink v18.7.0 — build 2033

Continuing the 18.7 refactor. This build lands the new Machine model that owns your workspace - this will be key for the new user interface -, plus a rebuilt app-startup and suspend/resume sequence, layout fixes, opt-in Projection changes, hardened Bookmarked Locations, and a new Styles import flow.

Before you update: Session State format changed again (build 2029). Running sessions from earlier builds won't restore — terminate any remote mosh-server sessions before updating.

Machine & Slots

Your workspace is now backed by a single Machine model. The Machine owns the whole lifecycle — it decides when sessions suspend, restore, and stop, and persists its structure whenever it changes. Previously these triggers were scattered across view controllers and fired unpredictably (a viewWillAppear that never came, etc.); now there's one source of truth.

What to expect: behavior should feel the same, but startup, backgrounding, and resume should be more predictable. Test: open several terminals across tabs, background/foreground the app, force-quit and relaunch, and confirm everything comes back where you left it.

App startup, suspend & resume

The startup and lifecycle sequence was rebuilt end to end:

• Bootstrap now waits on protected-data (File Protection) availability before touching sessions, fixing access issues when launching on a locked device.
• Symmetric suspend/restore with proper stop hooks; a Machine now suspends on its own once interaction stops.
• Cold vs. warm resume: warm resume no longer waits on the archive it doesn't need; cold resume reads the payload and retries if protected data isn't yet available.
• Locked-device handling: the app no longer wakes sessions just because iOS activated it to take a lock-screen screenshot — foreground is now the resume trigger.
• WebView silent refresh: there's a hidden state that neither cold nor warm resume covered — iOS can jettison and silently restart the web component on foreground, leaving the payload alive but the terminal blank. This is now captured and nudged to redraw. As a side effect, it also fixes cases where the terminal's UI state (font, theme, layout) silently reset to defaults instead of restoring the current one.
• Restore failures: if a payload can't be decoded (corruption, version mismatch), the terminal now shows a restore-failure state instead of hanging.

Test: lock/unlock while Blink runs, relaunch after a long background, and confirm sessions resume (or fail cleanly) with the correct appearance and no blank terminals or freezes.

Layout

• Layout lock: the workspace surface now locks in place without the keyboard "pulling" the view around. Resizing the window (the workspace) resets the lock.
• Layout on refresh: the layout now settles correctly when the app refreshes/re-lays out, with keyboard guides split out from view layout.
• Tab switches: fixed a case on iOS 27 where switching tabs left the bottom of the terminal clipped, hiding a few lines.

Test: layout should be preserved correctly across restarts and stay consistent as you switch tabs, rotate, and toggle the keyboard.

Known issue: in Fit mode, iOS may misreport the status bar height — if the layout looks off, moving/resizing the window again should correct it.

Projection is now opt-in

Projecting a terminal to an external display is now a choice:

• A-series devices: Projection ("Air Terminals") is opt-in — enable it under Settings → External Display. When off, the external display simply mirrors the device.
• Apple Silicon: no projection mode, since those devices drive external displays natively.

Bookmarked Locations — hardened

• Bootstrap: the terminal environment that registers bookmark paths is now set up lazily before a session starts and applied process-wide, rather than once at launch — fixing a race where bookmarks weren't yet accessible.
• Retries: path setup is tied to protected-data availability and retries instead of failing silently.
• Unavailable state: stale or unreachable bookmarks are now handled explicitly (refreshed when stale, reported as unavailable).

What to expect: bookmarked folders should be reachable from the command line more consistently, including right after launch. When a bookmark is unavailable, the app settings will report it accordingly instead of removing it silently.

Styles: fonts & themes

The Appearance/Styles flow was rebuilt (replacing the old storyboards):

• Import fonts & themes — locally or from a remote URL. Local themes drop into your resources; local fonts auto-generate the font-family CSS.
• System fonts — pick from installed monospaced system fonts (filtered to only usable ones).
• Alternative theme — assign a second theme per style that automatically kicks in under dark mode, or toggle it live with the switchTheme shortcut.

Test: import a custom font and theme, set an alternative dark theme, and switch appearance to confirm it swaps.

Selection fix

Fixed text selection copying the wrong range — getSelectionText now uses UTF-16 code-unit offsets instead of column widths, so selections containing wide characters copy correctly.

Cleanup & internals

• Removed all remaining mosh1 / ssh2 / libssh2 references (fully retired in favor of the new mosh/libssh stack).
• Fixed multiple crashes and reports from TF. Thanks!
• Dropped Mac Catalyst code (not shipping) and multiple other startup and termination performance tweaks.

[carloscabanero]

Thanks for all the reports.

• I will take care of the crashes from TestFlight. Thanks to the reports, should not be hard.
• About restoring the "font/size". Does this happen on running Mosh sessions? The TermUIState is now saved separately with everything else, so if the Mosh state is saved, the TermUIState should be restored too. Let me know.
• You can set the default font size on config > appearance.

[mistakenideas]

Thanks Carlos. I’ll stop sending reports now, but I thought a few may help ensure it was the same issue.

I realise maybe font/size was the wrong terminology and it was zoom that I was changing. And that was resetting within a session at times. Yes, this is within a running mosh session.

Found the setting, I was changing the font size in ‘Terminal>Display’ which is for an external display rather than ‘Terminal>Theme’. My mistake!

[carloscabanero]

About the crash, I think I have fixed it now. Let me know if you experience any other issues. The Terminal state restoration should work without issue, but if there is a crash, the UI State will not be stored and that could provoke the issues you see. It should be all good now. We barely have had any issues with 2033, and this crash actually only happened on your devices. It was lucky that we captured it there!

[mistakenideas]

Oh wow! Thanks and good to have caught it. If it was only happening for me I wonder if there is an interaction with some of the accessibility settings I use. I’ll update and keep an eye out and report back, it was fairly frequent for me.

[mistakenideas]

I haven’t been able to reproduce the crash so looks like the fix did the trick.

edit: still no sign of the crash after a couple more days intermittent usage :)

Terminal/UI state looking good too so it probably was a mixture of the crash and my confusion over settings!

[carloscabanero]

v18.7.0 build 2035

• Fixes a possible crash when returning to the app due to some race conditions with ios_system (thanks to mistakenidas for all the reports, this was a tricky one).
• The global appearance for the keyboard and UI chrome is now per Style. A style can follow the system, or be declared as light or dark.
• More stability fixes from TestFlight reports.

[carloscabanero]

v18.7.0 build 2045 & 2046 (AppStore)

• Updated Pragmatic Pro 903.
• Fixed IME colors (special thanks to MiRinChan for the help)
• FPE removed Code Action.
• Updated Hterm