## Thinking Path
> - Paperclip orchestrates AI agents for zero-human companies
> - A core part of that is the operator experience around reading issue
state, agent chat, and sub-task structure
> - The current branch had a long run of issue-detail and issue-list UX
fixes that all improve how humans follow and steer active work
> - Those changes mostly live in the UI/chat surface and should be
reviewed together instead of mixed with workspace/runtime work
> - This pull request packages the issue-detail, chat, markdown, and
sub-issue list improvements into one standalone change
> - The benefit is a cleaner, less jumpy, more reliable issue workflow
on desktop and mobile without coupling it to unrelated server/runtime
refactors
## What Changed
- Stabilized issue chat runtime wiring, optimistic comment handling,
queued-comment cancellation, and composer anchoring during live updates
- Fixed several issue-detail rendering and navigation regressions
including placeholder bleed, local polling scope, mobile inbox-to-issue
transitions, and visible refresh resets
- Improved markdown and rich-content handling with advisory image
normalization, editor fallback behavior, touch mention recovery, and
`issue:` quicklook links
- Refined sub-issue behavior with parent-derived defaults, current-user
inheritance fixes, empty-state cleanup, and a reusable issue-list
presentation for sub-issues
- Added targeted UI tests for the new issue-detail, chat scroll/message,
placeholder-data, markdown, and issue-list behaviors
## Verification
- `pnpm vitest run ui/src/components/IssueChatThread.test.tsx
ui/src/components/MarkdownEditor.test.tsx
ui/src/components/IssuesList.test.tsx
ui/src/context/LiveUpdatesProvider.test.tsx
ui/src/lib/issue-chat-messages.test.ts
ui/src/lib/issue-chat-scroll.test.ts
ui/src/lib/issue-detail-subissues.test.ts
ui/src/lib/query-placeholder-data.test.tsx
ui/src/hooks/usePaperclipIssueRuntime.test.tsx`
## Risks
- Medium: this branch touches the highest-traffic issue-detail UI paths,
so regressions would show up as chat/thread or sub-issue UX glitches
- The changes are UI-heavy and would benefit from reviewer screenshots
or a quick manual browser pass before merge
## Model Used
- OpenAI Codex coding agent (GPT-5-class runtime in Codex CLI; exact
deployed model ID is not exposed in this environment), reasoning
enabled, tool use and local code execution enabled
## Checklist
- [x] I have included a thinking path that traces from project context
to this change
- [x] I have specified the model used (with version and capability
details)
- [x] I have run tests locally and they pass
- [x] I have added or updated tests where applicable
- [ ] If this change affects the UI, I have included before/after
screenshots
- [ ] I have updated relevant documentation to reflect my changes
- [x] I have considered and documented any risks above
- [x] I will address all Greptile and reviewer comments before
requesting merge
---------
Co-authored-by: Paperclip <noreply@paperclip.ing>
## Thinking Path
> - Paperclip orchestrates AI agents for zero-human companies
> - The inline markdown editor (MarkdownEditor / MDXEditor) is used to
edit agent instructions, issue descriptions, and other content
> - When users paste agent instructions copied from terminals or
consoles, extra leading whitespace is uniformly added to every line
> - PR #2572 fixed markdown structure preservation on paste but did not
address the leading whitespace (dedent) problem
> - This pull request adds a Lexical paste normalization plugin that
strips common leading whitespace and normalizes line endings before
MDXEditor processes pasted content
> - The benefit is that pasted content from terminals/consoles renders
correctly without manual cleanup
## What Changed
- **`ui/src/lib/normalize-markdown.ts`** — Pure utility that computes
minimum common indentation across non-empty lines and strips it
(dedent), plus CRLF → LF normalization
- **`ui/src/lib/paste-normalization.ts`** — Lexical `PASTE_COMMAND`
plugin at `CRITICAL` priority that intercepts plain-text pastes,
normalizes the markdown, and re-dispatches cleaned content for MDXEditor
to process. Skips HTML-rich pastes.
- **`ui/src/components/MarkdownEditor.tsx`** — Registers the new plugin;
updates PR #2572's `handlePasteCapture` to use `normalizeMarkdown()`
(dedent + CRLF) instead of `normalizePastedMarkdown()` (CRLF only) for
the markdown-routing path
- **`ui/src/lib/paste-normalization.test.ts`** — 9 unit tests covering
dedent, CRLF normalization, mixed indent, empty lines, single-line
passthrough, and edge cases
## Verification
- `pnpm --dir ui exec vitest run src/lib/paste-normalization.test.ts` —
9 tests pass
- Manual: paste indented agent instructions from a terminal into any
inline markdown editor and confirm leading whitespace is stripped
## Risks
- Low risk. The plugin only activates for plain-text pastes (no HTML
clipboard data). HTML/rich pastes pass through unchanged. Single-line
pastes are not modified. The dedent logic is conservative — it only
strips whitespace common to all non-empty lines.
## Checklist
- [x] I have included a thinking path that traces from project context
to this change
- [x] I have run tests locally and they pass
- [x] I have added or updated tests where applicable
- [ ] If this change affects the UI, I have included before/after
screenshots
- [x] I have updated relevant documentation to reflect my changes
- [x] I have considered and documented any risks above
- [x] I will address all Greptile and reviewer comments before
requesting merge
---------
Co-authored-by: Paperclip <noreply@paperclip.ing>