dsh-matrix-theme

The Matrix movie theme for the dsh web GUI as an installable plugin: the selectable matrix theme (green-on-black palette over the dark base), a digital-rain ambient backdrop (a faithful port of the zengrz.github.io glyph wall), its General-settings toggle row, and a rain-quality row that trades backdrop effects for performance on slower machines. One package carries both roles: the dsh.bundle patch layer (cordis.patch.yml inserts the ui-matrix-theme browser roster row) and the dsh.client plugin itself (lib/client.js, prebuilt and committed — no build step runs at install time).

Install

dsh plugin --profile <name> add github:zengrz/dsh-matrix-theme

Pin a commit so a later push cannot silently change what runs:

dsh plugin --profile <name> add github:zengrz/dsh-matrix-theme#<sha>

No build permission (allowBuilds) is needed: the published entry points are committed, and the package has no prepare script.

Requirements and compatibility

• On a harness that declares the shell.backdrop slot (ui-layout from the dsh release that introduced the ambient backdrop slot), the rain renders inside the frame's backdrop layer — below every column, click-through, and managed by the slot system.
• On a harness that predates the shell.backdrop slot (e.g. dsh 0.1.0-rc.8), the plugin detects the missing slot at boot and falls back to a fixed-position DOM canvas behind the app root, driving the same RainEngine. The palette and the General-settings toggle work identically on both paths; only the backdrop's mount site differs. The fallback retires itself if the slot is later declared (e.g. a harness upgrade mid-session via HMR).
• The patch appends and does not dedupe: adding this plugin to a profile whose layers already register ui-matrix-theme — the stock dsh-web-app bundle ships the theme in-box from the same release — fails the load with duplicate loader entry id: ui-matrix-theme. Such profiles already have the theme; this plugin targets custom browser-surface rosters and web-app versions that predate the theme.
• The browser half resolves its platform peers (react, the @deepseek-ai/dsh-client-* module table) from the host profile's own client stack; this repository bundles only the theme's own code.

Rain quality

The General section gains a Rain effects row (below the Matrix theme row, visible while the matrix theme is active) with three levels:

• Full — the faithful reference effect: full-density glyph wall, per-glyph churn, cursor spotlight, and the 3D tilt.
• Lite — for older or integrated-GPU machines: the column/row grid draws at half density (a quarter of the per-frame glyph draws), glyph churn and the cursor spotlight are dropped, and columns faded to near-invisible depth are culled entirely. The cheap signature effects (the 3D tilt and the marching white cell) stay.
• Off — no canvas at all: the green palette stays, the rain costs nothing (same skip as prefers-reduced-motion: reduce).

The level is a plugin-owned browser preference persisted to localStorage under dsh-matrix-theme:rain-quality; storage failures only disable persistence. Changing the level while the rain runs replaces the engine (the grid rebuilds at the new density).

Model Experience

None: the theme manages browser-side preferences (theme selection and rain quality) and the backdrop is decorative (aria-hidden); nothing reaches a model request.

Rebuilding the artifacts

lib/ is committed. To regenerate it after editing src/, build inside a deepseek-harness checkout (the client bundle's loader-handoff id must match this package name). Create a machine-local build.tsdown.config.ts (gitignored):

import { clientBundle } from '<harness>/packages/client/tsdown.client.ts'
export default clientBundle('dsh-matrix-theme', ['src/index.ts'])

then run:

cd <this-repo>
ln -sfn <harness>/packages/client/ui-matrix-theme/node_modules node_modules
<harness>/node_modules/.bin/tsdown --config build.tsdown.config.ts

License

MIT, matching the dsh family. The theme engine is a port of the MIT-licensed zengrz.github.io effect.