Desktop App

NLUI includes a native desktop application built with Wails v2, featuring a React frontend embedded in a Go binary.

Prerequisites

• Go 1.25+
• Node.js 20+
• Wails CLI v2

Install Wails:

go install github.com/wailsapp/wails/v2/cmd/wails@latest

Development

cd desktop
wails dev

This starts the app in development mode with hot-reload for the frontend.

Build

cd desktop
wails build

The binary is output to desktop/build/bin/.

Platform	Output
Windows	build/bin/nlui-desktop.exe
macOS	build/bin/nlui-desktop.app
Linux	build/bin/nlui-desktop

Architecture

The desktop app is a separate Go module (desktop/go.mod) that uses replace to reference the main NLUI packages:

desktop/
├── main.go              # Wails app bootstrap
├── app.go               # Go backend (bound to frontend)
├── frontend/            # React app (Vite)
│   ├── src/
│   └── dist/            # Embedded in binary via go:embed
├── go.mod               # Separate module
└── build/

Go ↔ Frontend Binding

The App struct methods are automatically exposed to the frontend via Wails bindings:

// Go side
func (a *App) Chat(msg string, convID string) { ... }
func (a *App) ListTargets() []map[string]interface{} { ... }
func (a *App) SaveLLMConfig(apiBase, apiKey, model string) error { ... }

// Frontend side (auto-generated)
import { Chat, ListTargets, SaveLLMConfig } from '../wailsjs/go/main/App'

Notes

• GPU disabled — WebviewGpuIsDisabled: true is set for Windows compatibility on some machines
• Startup — Network I/O in OnStartup blocks UI rendering. All initialization is async
• go:embed — The frontend dist/ folder is embedded into the binary at compile time, producing a single-file executable
• Nil slices — Go nil slices serialize as JSON null, not []. All slice fields returned to the frontend must be initialized (e.g., []string{})