This is the canonical guide for how Fusion native shells (mobile and desktop) connect to remote Fusion dashboards, persist saved connections, and hand off shell state to the dashboard.
Native shells expose a shared window.fusionShell bridge that the dashboard reads through ShellContext.
- Mobile shell always runs in remote mode and requires an active connection profile.
- Desktop shell supports both Local Fusion and Remote Server modes.
- Web/PWA does not use shell onboarding.
The dashboard gates first-run shell onboarding in requiresNativeShellOnboarding(...) (packages/dashboard/app/App.tsx):
host === "mobile-shell": onboarding is required untilactiveProfileIdis set.host === "desktop-shell":desktopMode === "local": onboarding is not required.desktopMode === "remote"(or unset): onboarding is required untilactiveProfileIdis set.
NativeShellOnboardingModal then provides:
- Desktop mode choice (desktop only):
- Local Fusion → calls
setDesktopMode("local"). - Remote Server → stays in remote flow.
- Local Fusion → calls
- Remote connection entry (mobile + desktop remote mode):
- Scan QR (
startQrScan()) - Manual fields: profile name, server URL, optional auth token
- Scan QR (
- Continue:
- Saves profile via
saveProfile(...) - Sets desktop mode to remote when relevant
- Activates profile via
setActiveProfile(...) - Redirects to selected remote dashboard URL (adds
rt=<token>query when token is present)
- Saves profile via
QR scan is optional convenience. Manual entry is always supported.
QR payload parsing accepts either:
- JSON payload with
serverUrland optionalauthToken - URL payload, reading token from
authTokenorrt
If scanning fails or is unavailable, users can continue with manual URL + token entry.
Profiles are first-class saved objects shared by onboarding and Connection Manager:
nameserverUrl- optional
authToken - timestamps (
createdAt,updatedAt,lastUsedAt)
Connection Manager supports:
- Use (activate profile)
- Edit (update name/URL/token)
- Delete
- Add connection
Activation updates activeProfileId and stamps lastUsedAt on the selected profile.
Desktop shell stores shell settings separately from Fusion project/global settings.
When desktop mode is remote and an active profile exists, App.tsx redirects to that profile URL and appends rt when a token exists.
When desktop mode is local and the local server reports ready with a port, App.tsx redirects to http://localhost:<port>.
- Mobile shell: connection profiles + active profile are persisted through Capacitor Preferences (
packages/mobile/src/plugins/connection-profiles.ts). - Desktop shell: shell settings are persisted in app-owned JSON at
app.getPath("userData")/shell-connections.json(packages/desktop/src/shell-settings.ts).
Tokenized URLs and QR payloads are secrets.
- Treat
rt/authTokenvalues like passwords. - Do not paste tokenized links into chats, screenshots, or tickets.
- Prefer short-lived token workflows when sharing access.
For canonical token caveats and operator guidance, see Remote Access runbook.