Desktop Notifications

Fabric supports desktop notifications to alert you when commands complete, which is especially useful for long-running tasks or when you're multitasking.

Quick Start

Enable notifications with the --notification flag:

bash

fabric --pattern summarize --notification < article.txt

Configuration

Command Line Options

--notification: Enable desktop notifications when command completes
--notification-command: Use a custom notification command instead of built-in notifications

YAML Configuration

Add notification settings to your ~/.config/fabric/config.yaml:

yaml

# Enable notifications by default
notification: true

# Optional: Custom notification command
notificationCommand: 'notify-send --urgency=normal "$1" "$2"'

Platform Support

macOS

Default: Uses osascript (built into macOS)
Enhanced: Install terminal-notifier for better notifications:
bash
```
brew install terminal-notifier
```

Linux

Requirement: Install notify-send:

bash

# Ubuntu/Debian
sudo apt install libnotify-bin

# Fedora
sudo dnf install libnotify

Windows

Default: Uses PowerShell message boxes (built-in)

Custom Notification Commands

The --notification-command flag allows you to use custom notification scripts or commands. The command receives the title as $1 and message as $2 as shell positional arguments.

Security Note: The title and message content are properly escaped to prevent command injection attacks from AI-generated output containing shell metacharacters.

Examples

macOS with custom sound:

bash

fabric --pattern analyze_claims --notification-command 'osascript -e "display notification \"$2\" with title \"$1\" sound name \"Ping\""' < document.txt

Linux with urgency levels:

bash

fabric --pattern extract_wisdom --notification-command 'notify-send --urgency=critical "$1" "$2"' < video-transcript.txt

Custom script:

bash

fabric --pattern summarize --notification-command '/path/to/my-notification-script.sh "$1" "$2"' < report.pdf

Testing your custom command:

bash

# Test that $1 and $2 are passed correctly
fabric --pattern raw_query --notification-command 'echo "Title: $1, Message: $2"' "test input"

Notification Content

Notifications include:

Title: "Fabric Command Complete" or "Fabric: [pattern] Complete"
Message: Brief summary of the output (first 100 characters)

For long outputs, the message is truncated with "..." to fit notification display limits.

Use Cases

Long-Running Tasks

bash

# Process large document with notifications
fabric --pattern analyze_paper --notification < research-paper.pdf

# Extract wisdom from long video with alerts
fabric -y "https://youtube.com/watch?v=..." --pattern extract_wisdom --notification

Background Processing

bash

# Process multiple files and get notified when each completes
for file in *.txt; do
    fabric --pattern summarize --notification < "$file" &
done

Integration with Other Tools

bash

# Combine with other commands
curl -s "https://api.example.com/data" | \
    fabric --pattern analyze_data --notification --output results.md

Troubleshooting

No Notifications Appearing

Check system notifications are enabled for Terminal/your shell
Verify notification tools are installed:
- macOS: which osascript (should exist)
- Linux: which notify-send
- Windows: where.exe powershell

Test with simple command:

bash

echo "test" | fabric --pattern raw_query --notification --dry-run

Notification Permission Issues

On some systems, you may need to grant notification permissions to your terminal application:

macOS: System Preferences → Security & Privacy → Privacy → Notifications → Enable for Terminal
Linux: Depends on desktop environment; usually automatic
Windows: Usually works by default

Custom Commands Not Working

Ensure your custom notification command is executable
Test the command manually with sample arguments
Check that all required dependencies are installed

Advanced Configuration

Environment-Specific Settings

Create different configuration files for different environments:

bash

# Work computer (quieter notifications)
fabric --config ~/.config/fabric/work-config.yaml --notification

# Personal computer (with sound)
fabric --config ~/.config/fabric/personal-config.yaml --notification

Integration with Task Management

bash

# Custom script that also logs to task management system
notificationCommand: '/usr/local/bin/fabric-notify-and-log.sh "$1" "$2"'

Examples

See docs/notification-config.yaml for a complete configuration example with various notification command options.