rustification-client

Desktop chat client for Rustification. Built with Tauri v2 (Rust backend) and React + TypeScript (frontend).

Tech stack

Layer	Technology
Desktop shell	Tauri v2
Frontend	React 18 + TypeScript, Vite
HTTP	reqwest (Rust) via Tauri commands
Persistence	tauri-plugin-store (JWT token, user ID)
Build (Linux)	nix-shell

Features

• Login / Register — authenticates against the rustification-server, stores JWT via tauri-plugin-store
• Workspace list — browse workspaces the current user belongs to
• Chat page — conversation list, message history, and real-time polling for new messages
• Message input — send messages to any conversation
• Member panel — view conversation members
• Settings page — user preferences

Prerequisites

• Rust + Cargo
• Node.js 18+ and npm
• Tauri v2 system dependencies (see below)
• A running rustification-server

System dependencies (Linux)

The project ships a shell.nix. If you use Nix, enter the dev shell first:

nix-shell

This provides: cargo, rustc, pkg-config, glib, gtk3, webkitgtk_4_1, libsoup_3, openssl, librsvg.

Without Nix, install the equivalent packages via your system package manager. On Debian/Ubuntu:

sudo apt install libgtk-3-dev libwebkit2gtk-4.1-dev libsoup-3.0-dev \
  libayatana-appindicator3-dev librsvg2-dev

Getting started

# Install frontend dependencies
npm install

# Start in development mode (hot-reload frontend + Tauri window)
# Must be run inside nix-shell on NixOS / Nix systems
npm run tauri dev

The client defaults to http://localhost:3000/api/v1 as the server base URL (configurable at runtime via Settings).

Build

# Must be run inside nix-shell on NixOS / Nix systems
npm run tauri build

Output bundles (.deb, .AppImage, etc.) are written to src-tauri/target/release/bundle/.

Project structure

src/                        # React frontend
├── main.tsx                # Entry point
├── App.tsx                 # Router + AuthContext provider
├── theme.ts                # MUI / global theme
├── styles.css
├── contexts/
│   └── AuthContext.tsx     # Auth state (token, user ID, login/logout)
├── pages/
│   ├── LoginPage.tsx
│   ├── WorkspacePage.tsx
│   ├── ChatPage.tsx
│   └── SettingsPage.tsx
└── components/
    ├── ConversationList.tsx
    ├── MessageList.tsx
    ├── MessageInput.tsx
    ├── MemberPanel.tsx
    └── Toast.tsx

src-tauri/                  # Tauri Rust backend
├── Cargo.toml
└── src/
    ├── lib.rs              # Tauri builder, plugin + command registration
    ├── main.rs
    ├── state.rs            # AppState: reqwest client, token, base URL
    ├── models.rs           # Shared response types
    └── commands/
        ├── user.rs         # login, register, refresh_session, logout
        ├── workspace.rs    # list_workspaces
        ├── conversation.rs # list_conversations
        └── message.rs      # list_messages, send_message

Tauri commands

The frontend calls these via invoke():

Command	Description
login	Authenticates and stores JWT + user ID
register	Registers a new account
refresh_session	Refreshes the JWT using the stored refresh token
logout	Clears stored credentials
list_workspaces	Returns workspaces for the current user
list_conversations	Returns conversations for a workspace
list_messages	Returns messages for a conversation
send_message	Posts a new message

Server connection

The default base URL is http://localhost:3000/api/v1. To point the client at a different server, update the URL in Settings — it is persisted in the Tauri store across sessions.