Aiden v4.16.1 — Windows Reliability and Updater Hardening

Aiden v4.16.1 — Windows Reliability and Updater Hardening

Aiden v4.16.1 is a focused reliability release that hardens self-updates, terminal shutdown, resize behavior, Windows process lifecycle handling, and runtime validation.

This release closes issues found through real packaged Windows testing after v4.16.0.

Highlights

• Fixed self-update targeting for user-owned npm installations
• Prevented false Administrator requirements
• Replaced frozen or misleading updater progress with truthful stages
• Added exact installed-version verification
• Improved update failure classification
• Fixed clean terminal handoff after /quit
• Prevented composer and footer repaint after returning to PowerShell
• Improved bottom-region resize re-anchoring
• Strengthened Windows IPC, SQLite, process, and ConPTY validation
• Fully green Node 20 and Node 22 cross-platform CI matrix

Self-update reliability

The updater now resolves the npm prefix that owns the running Aiden installation instead of blindly using an unrelated configured prefix.

The update flow now:

• identifies the active installation
• resolves its exact npm prefix
• checks actual target writability
• installs the exact requested version
• preserves the target prefix during Windows helper handoff
• verifies the installed package on disk
• reports structured failures when installation does not complete

This prevents user-owned installations from incorrectly requesting Administrator access.

Truthful update progress

The old fixed 3% spawning display has been removed.

Updates now report real stages:

• resolving installation
• starting installer
• installing package
• verifying installed version
• complete or failed

Progress no longer implies work is happening when no confirmed installation stage has begun.

Clean terminal shutdown

Aiden now explicitly releases ownership of the fixed bottom terminal region during shutdown.

After /quit:

• the composer is cleared
• the status strip is released
• the PowerShell prompt returns normally
• no delayed Aiden repaint should appear
• no Aiden process should remain running

Packaged Windows smoke testing confirmed a clean shell immediately after exit and after a delayed five-second marker.

Resize and terminal rendering

Bottom-region resize re-anchoring now clears the previously owned rows before repainting.

Windows activity rendering tests now validate the final rendered terminal screen rather than relying on brittle raw ConPTY cursor sequences.

This improves confidence around:

• narrow terminals
• resize during provider activity
• approval handoff
• timer settlement
• composer ownership
• final screen cleanup

Windows runtime validation

Windows process tests now:

• wait for child close, not only exit
• flush IPC messages before intentional crash exits
• close SQLite databases before process termination
• remove temporary stderr listeners
• dispose PTY subscriptions and timers
• validate rendered terminal state through the shared terminal-screen harness

Validation

The final release passed:

• Security scan
• CodeQL JavaScript/TypeScript
• CodeQL Python
• Ubuntu Node 20
• Ubuntu Node 22
• macOS Node 20
• macOS Node 22
• Windows Node 20
• Windows Node 22
• Windows non-PTY test suite
• Windows serial PTY test suite
• TypeScript typecheck
• Production build
• Isolated npm tarball installation
• Packaged /usage smoke
• Clean /quit shell handoff
• Lingering-process check

The final Windows validation included:

• 6,839 deterministic tests passed
• 27 Windows PTY tests passed
• repeated process-recovery and timer-rendering stress runs

Installation

npm install -g aiden-runtime@4.16.1