reverse-engineering-anything/docs/electron-observation.md

# Electron file-page observation

REA can attach to an Electron/Chromium CDP endpoint and inspect existing `file://` renderer pages without evaluating JavaScript or invoking Electron APIs. The request supplies the endpoint directly; REA accepts only literal-port loopback HTTP endpoints. Selecting an endpoint exposes every Electron target it serves, including local file paths and page metadata.

Disconnecting the inspection's page session can clear caller-owned
`navigator.platform` emulation inside Chromium. REA cannot restore another
client's complete user-agent/client-hint configuration. Use a disposable target
or let the owning client reapply its configuration; see the shared
[CDP state limitation](browser-observation.md#provider-authorities).

This passive runtime surface is distinct from the target-free static
[`analyze_javascript_application`](javascript-artifact-reconstruction.md)
workflow. Static analysis reads a local ASAR or extracted directory without
executing application code. Passive observation inspects an existing Electron
page. The results keep static inferences and runtime observations distinct.
Packaged fuse state is a separate static read:
[`inspect_electron_fuses`](electron-fuses.md) reports whether this binary will
honor Inspector flags, `ELECTRON_RUN_AS_NODE`, embedded ASAR integrity, and
`app.asar`-only loading.
Use the separate
[`reconcile_javascript_runtime`](javascript-runtime-reconciliation.md) workflow
when both Evidence sets already exist.

## Target boundary

The request supplies a literal-port loopback endpoint and, for inspection, a
target ID. REA accepts local hostless `file://` URLs that resolve to regular
files, including pages a packaged application serves from inside `app.asar`.
For those, the first `.asar` path component that is a regular file is the
archive, the remainder must name a regular file in its header, and the reported
path is the canonical archive path joined with that member. Remote hosts,
encoded path separators, ASAR directories or links, and nonexistent paths are
rejected. The endpoint exposes every eligible target and its local path
metadata.

## Workflow

`list_electron_targets` returns every eligible target served by the supplied endpoint in one inline array.

For the MCP follow-up call, pass the same literal-loopback endpoint and the selected target ID to `inspect_electron_page`. REA rediscovers targets and validates the ID against the live endpoint before inspection.

```bash
rea list-electron-targets http://127.0.0.1:9223 --json
rea inspect-electron-page http://127.0.0.1:9223 TARGET_ID \
  --observation-ms 100 --json
```

Script content is excluded by default. Setting `include_script_sources` in the
request returns the selected target's script sources:

```bash
rea inspect-electron-page http://127.0.0.1:9223 TARGET_ID \
  --include-script-sources \
  --json
```

The normalized result contains canonical local paths, frame and DOM
structure, resource metadata, stable script/resource identities, explicit
completeness, and content-addressed script artifacts. Script metadata
retains its execution-context frame ID when CDP supplies one. The capture also
inventories worker, service-worker, and shared-worker targets with
validated opener-target and parent-frame IDs. Worker discovery uses passive
target metadata; REA does not attach to or execute code in those targets.
Collection counts and aggregate script-source bytes are not capped. Like every
target, frame, script, and resource, a worker URL must resolve to a local
file before it is retained. Relationship IDs improve
attribution but do not prove which static module started a worker or that its
work completed.

Inspection does not retain DOM values, execute renderer code, navigate, click,
invoke Electron IPC, close a target, or terminate the application.

## Active Electron scenarios

The scenario request supplies the Electron executable and application entry
point, plus any arguments and actions. The application root defaults to the
entry point's parent directory and can be supplied when the app uses a different
root. REA launches that executable through
the official Playwright Electron API and owns its lifetime. It accepts click/wait actions,
window-targeted renderer reload/crash actions, and synthetic `open-url` or
`second-instance` deep-link delivery. It records capture-scoped window and
WebContents identities, process metrics, and IPC channel and value-shape metadata.
Payload values are not retained.

Run the real fixture verifier with an operator-provided Electron runtime:

```bash
REA_ELECTRON_EXECUTABLE=/absolute/path/to/electron npm run verify:electron
```

This operation actively launches and interacts with the selected target. It is
not a passive CDP observation. The owned process keeps normal host filesystem
and network privileges, so lifecycle ownership does not make it a sandbox.

The CLI and MCP surfaces accept the same schema. For a JSON request file:

```bash
rea capture-electron-scenario scenario.json --json
```

The result records action status and targets, correlated app/window/WebContents,
preload, session, navigation, shell, permission, popup, download, protocol,
native-addon, process, and IPC timeline events. IPC channels and argument-shape
metadata retain their observed lengths; payload values are never retained.
Renderer crash/restart and deep-link actions are synthetic
scenario controls; their attempted and observed outcomes remain in the
timeline. The active hook blocks and records external shell/navigation,
permission, download, popup, updater, and OS-integration effects. The timeline
is explicitly partial when attachment starts after application activity. The
startup, including the initial state snapshot, has a 60-second deadline.
Actions wait until completion or request cancellation; a click whose target
never appears, or a `wait` without `window_index` in an app that opens no
window, remains pending until cancelled. After cancellation, the final state
read has 5 seconds before REA keeps the initial snapshot instead; the
cancellation keeps the caller's reason and records that expiry in its
diagnostics.
CLI SIGINT/SIGTERM requests cancellation and awaits owned-process cleanup.
Window IDs, URLs, and cached titles come from one main-process Electron snapshot,
so a crashed renderer does not require a successful renderer-side title query.
Window instrumentation uses Electron's window-created event, including runtimes
with a read-only `BrowserWindow` export. Preload configuration comes from the
window's runtime metadata, including Electron's optional internal preload
descriptor when web preferences omit it. This descriptor is verified on
Electron 44.7.0; runtimes that expose neither representation retain an unavailable
path. A configured path or working IPC handler does not prove preload execution.
If cleanup cannot be verified, the error retains collected observations in
`details.partial_observation` and marks their application cleanup `unverified`.
Cleanup uncertainty does not authorize signaling unrelated processes.

Main-process IPC recording keeps original-function removal for `on` and `once`
registrations and records a fired `once` callback once. Native Node.js owns
removal order and traversal, including listeners registered by removal observers;
the hook translates only its own recording wrappers at the removal boundary.
Wrapper metadata uses weak keys and does not retain removed registrations.
Wrapper metadata operations, private collection methods and traversal constructors are captured
before target startup; later replacement of their global bindings does not
change listener registration or removal.

An `on` listener's application-defined `.apply` receives the original argument-list
object unchanged. Borrowing the exposed method preserves its dynamic receiver.
Because that method owns argument interpretation and may not
invoke the callback, the hook records a bounded `ipc-observation-gap` timeline
entry with the registered channel rather than an IPC invocation. Its empty
`argument_shapes` means unobserved arguments, not a zero-argument callback;
callback execution and result remain unknown. Coverage and retention include
these gaps even when their individual records are dropped. Normal native
dispatch continues to record actual invocation frames. Evidence snapshots copy
retained arrays and counters without invoking application iterators or Array
species.

Listener-chain recognition distinguishes owned, unowned and unknown metadata.
Data links may be inherited; absence is established only after completing the
bounded prototype lookup. Exhausting either walk, encountering a getter or seeing a Proxy leaves
ownership unknown. The hook preserves native registration without adding another
recording wrapper and retains a `listener-chain` observation gap after successful
registration. This gap does not prove IPC delivery. An existing inner recording
wrapper can still report its actual invocation; otherwise callback activity
remains unobserved. Setter-only properties have a known undefined read.
Data-descriptor parsing is shared with removal normalization.

This does not establish complete JavaScript function introspection equivalence.
Caller-defined `.listener` properties can change the identity exposed by
`listeners()` and meta-events; accessors and Proxy metadata are not followed for
wrapper recognition. Re-registering a raw recording wrapper on another channel
retains the original registration's channel attribution.
Mutating `.listener` on a raw recording wrapper can also prevent removal through
application decorators; the reproduced identity conflict is tracked in
[#4513](https://github.com/morluto/rea/issues/4513).

### Target fuse prerequisites

Active scenario capture requires that the target Electron executable honors Node CLI inspector flags (`--inspect` or `--remote-debugging-port`) so that Playwright can establish its DevTools protocol session.

When an Electron executable explicitly disables the `EnableNodeCliInspectArguments` fuse (or removes the capability), `capture-electron-scenario` fails immediately before process launch with an `AnalysisUnsupportedTargetError` ("unsupported_target") rather than waiting for the startup deadline. For targets with disabled inspector fuses, use passive CDP inspection via `inspect_electron_page` or run against an unrestricted development binary with the extracted `app.asar`.

The real verifier exercises compiled CLI and stdio MCP discovery, page/script
inspection, static/runtime reconciliation, active observation, and CLI SIGTERM
cleanup before checking the IPC, renderer crash/reload, utility/child-process,
deep-link, and blocked-effect fixture. A cleanup error keeps the full lane failed
even when the retained capture contains useful observations.

Active Electron Evidence can also be supplied to
[`reconcile_javascript_runtime`](javascript-runtime-reconciliation.md). That
projection is intentionally target-only and partial: it binds the selected
application path and capture outcome to the static graph, while frames, scripts,
workers, and execution claims remain unavailable until a separate passive runtime
capture provides them.

ASAR observation reads the header through one open file handle, validates its declared lengths against the archive size, and limits encoded JSON headers to 16 MiB before parsing. The header cache also retains at most 16 MiB of encoded headers across eight archives. Oversized headers produce a scope refusal.