nsh_shared

Native Shell + nativeapi examples

Three small Rust desktop apps combine Native Shell (NSH) 0.4.0 for the UI with the local nativeapi Rust binding for system integration:

Example	Native APIs
Tray icon	TrayIcon, TrayManager, Menu, MenuItem, Image
Global shortcut	ShortcutManager, Shortcut
Message dialog	MessageDialog, DialogModality

Run

On macOS (14+) or Windows, install Rust 1.98+, CMake and a C++ compiler, and initialize the core submodule from the repository root:

git submodule update --init core
cargo run --manifest-path examples/nsh_tray_icon_example/Cargo.toml
cargo run --manifest-path examples/nsh_shortcut_example/Cargo.toml
cargo run --manifest-path examples/nsh_message_dialog_example/Cargo.toml

Use cargo run: these apps embed NSH in their own host, which installs the native dispatcher and releases native resources after the NSH engine stops. The nsh CLI is not required. Closing the example window quits the app and removes its tray icon or unregisters its shortcut.

The examples and this support crate share a separate Cargo workspace rooted here, with one lockfile and build directory. From the repository root:

cargo check --manifest-path examples/nsh_shared/Cargo.toml --workspace --locked
cargo fmt --manifest-path examples/nsh_shared/Cargo.toml --all -- --check
# macOS desktop, with Accessibility permission for the terminal:
python3 tools/gui/nsh_examples_test_macos.py --build

Linux is currently excluded: nativeapi links GTK 3 and NSH's Linux backend links GTK 4. Loading both GTK major versions in the same process is unsupported. These examples also do not target mobile or the web.

Threading and ownership

NSH runs Rust components, event handlers and reactive signals on an engine thread. The system tray, menus and dialogs belong to the platform thread. on_main schedules a closure there and asynchronously returns owned data. Native callbacks send channel messages; an NSH spawn task receives them and writes signals on the engine thread. Native handles and signals never cross threads.

On macOS, dispatch uses the main dispatch queue and NSH's run_app. On Windows, the host mounts NSH's public AppView on the calling thread and pumps both its window messages and dispatched native work. It does not start a second nativeapi Application::run loop.

The examples keep native handles in platform-thread storage until the host's shutdown callback. Listeners, menu items and registered shortcuts are released there before the process exits. nsh_example_shared is example infrastructure, not a published binding.