visual-review

name	visual-review
description	Visually review Freedom's GUI rendering without a Wayland display: export a page to a PNG headless with `freedom --download-png=PATH` and Read the image to verify text/layout/colours/artifacts. Use when validating any render/layout/CSS/image change (CLAUDE.md §3 validation step), comparing before/after, or checking a URL or local HTML file paints correctly.
trigger	/visual-review

/visual-review — Freedom render verification (headless)

Freedom's on-screen renderer needs Wayland, which is not available to an automated agent in this environment. freedom --download-png=PATH exports the exact same display list the GUI would paint to a single PNG bitmap (no window), so the render can be inspected by just Read-ing the image. This is the validation step that CLAUDE.md §3 makes mandatory for render/layout/CSS/image work.

Prefer PNG over PDF. A PNG is a single image read in one step — far cheaper (fewer tokens) than a PDF, which must first be rasterised with mutool (or read page-by-page). Use --download-pdf only when you specifically need the vector document (selectable text, real pagination), not for routine visual review.

The PNG path is the same code as the GUI "Save as PNG"/"Save as PDF" (write_doc_png/ write_doc_pdf → layout_doc/paint_content_row), so what you see is what the window paints, minus images (off by default — they appear as labelled placeholders unless enabled).

Prerequisites

• A built binary: make (use ./build/freedom, not a stale freedom on PATH).
• Nothing else for PNG. (PDF fallback only: mutool from mupdf-tools.)

Steps

Use the session scratchpad for the image (never /tmp directly, never the repo tree). Let $SP be the scratchpad directory given in the environment.

1. Export the page to PNG (a URL, or a local .html file):

   ./build/freedom --download-png=$SP/frame.png <URL-or-file.html>
   

   stdout is one line: Saved PNG (<h> px): <path>. Exit 0 = ok; exit 1 = nothing to render / write error; exit 2 = usage error (e.g. --download-png with no =PATH). For a page that needs Tor/I2P or weak TLS, add the usual flags (--tor, --i2p, --insecure); JS with --js=on; author CSS with --author-css.

   The PNG is one continuous bitmap of the whole page (1000px wide; height follows the content, capped at 30000px — a taller page is clipped).

2. Read the image with the Read tool: Read $SP/frame.png. Done.

3. Verify against the rendering checklist (below). State findings plainly; if a reference screenshot exists for this page, compare against it.

PDF fallback (only when you need the vector document)

./build/freedom --download-pdf=$SP/frame.pdf <URL-or-file.html>
mutool draw -r 96 -o $SP/frame-%d.png $SP/frame.pdf   # one PNG per page

If mutool is unavailable, Read $SP/frame.pdf with the pages parameter.

5. Optional — enable what's off by default to review more:
   • Author colours/CSS and images are off by default (Privacy by Default). The headless export uses the safe caps, so author colours and images show as the theme/placeholder. To review them, that capability has to be turned on in the render path being tested (see render_doc/rdp_caps); note this in your findings rather than assuming the page is broken.

Rendering checklist

• Text legible, correctly wrapped, no overlap with neighbouring blocks.
• Block layout: headings vs paragraphs vs lists vs tables positioned sensibly; list markers (•/N.) and indentation present; table cells form a grid (columns aligned).
• Inline emphasis: b/strong bold, i/em italic; links coloured + underlined.
• Colours/theme: the export is dark-on-white (forced light theme for print/raster); banners (tracking warning) and form buttons painted with their theme colours.
• Images: with images off, a bordered placeholder labelled with the render_policy decision (image blocked: …) — never a remote fetch.
• Artifacts: no clipped text, no garbled glyphs (accents should survive — CP-1252→UTF-8), no missing rows, pagination doesn't split a row mid-line.

One-shot helper (export + read)

URL="$1"; OUT="${2:-$SP/frame}"
./build/freedom --download-png="$OUT.png" "$URL" && echo "Read $OUT.png"

Notes

• --download-png=PATH / --download-pdf=PATH use PATH verbatim (a trusted local CLI argument). The fail-closed sanitisation of a hostile page title into a filename (pe_safe_basename/pe_build_path_ext) applies only to the GUI "Save as PNG/PDF", where the name comes from remote content.
• The export touches no network beyond fetching the page itself; nothing is cached or phoned home. Local files get a file:// origin (relative images confined to the doc directory).
• LSan reports one-time libfontconfig allocations as leaks when running an ASan build directly; they are suppressed by tests/asan.supp (make asan is clean).