Shorten the icon reveal when opening a tray menu

The menu is its own window anchored where the item was revealed, so it
survives if the bar re-hides immediately. Revealing for ~0.3s instead of
over a second makes the flash far less noticeable while still opening
the menu in view.

💘 Generated with Crush

Assisted-by: Crush:deepseek-v4.1-flash

AGENTS.md

@@ -135,12 +135,16 @@ preferred position controls where the hidden/kept boundary lands:
   hidden too; above ~300 app icons (Now Playing, TextInput) leak back.
 - `debug.spacerPos` (Double) overrides the seed for tuning without rebuilding.
 - Pressing a tray tile calls `MenuBarItemManager.press`. A hidden item sits
-  off-screen, and its menu would open off-screen too, so press briefly
+  off-screen, and its menu opens off-screen too (verified with `--diag-press`:
-  `suspend()`s the hider, waits ~0.18s for the layout to settle, performs the
+  the menu window lands at negative x). So press briefly `suspend()`s the hider,
-  accessibility action (`kAXPressAction`, then `kAXShowMenuAction`), and
+  waits ~0.2s for the layout to settle, performs the accessibility action
-  `resume()`s ~1s later. The reveal is momentary, not for the whole time the
+  (`kAXPressAction`, then `kAXShowMenuAction`), and `resume()`s ~0.1s later. The
-  panel is open. macOS does not let us place or anchor another app's menu
+  menu is its own window anchored at the item's on-screen spot, so it survives
-  anywhere else, so a momentary reveal is the only way to show it in view.
+  re-hiding.
+- **Cannot reveal a single icon.** The spacer hides a contiguous block to its
+  left, so a press can only reveal the whole block. Isolating one item would
+  need either per-item ordering control (not available) or covering the icons
+  with an overlay window instead of moving them off-screen.
 - **Order matters**: `AppDelegate` must call `setupStatusItem()` *before*
   `MenuBarHider.shared.prepare()`. If the hider contracts the bar first, the
   hamburger is created into the collapsed space and lands off-screen.

Sources/SimpleTopBar/App.swift

@@ -48,6 +48,27 @@ final class AppDelegate: NSObject, NSApplicationDelegate {
         setupStatusItem()
         MenuBarHider.shared.prepare()
 
+        if CommandLine.arguments.contains("--diag-press") {
+            DispatchQueue.main.asyncAfter(deadline: .now() + 2.0) {
+                MenuBarHider.shared.suspend()
+            }
+            DispatchQueue.main.asyncAfter(deadline: .now() + 2.25) {
+                if let item = MenuBarItemManager.enumerate().first(where: {
+                    $0.title.lowercased().contains("wireguard")
+                }) {
+                    NSLog("diag-press: pressing \(item.appName) after brief reveal")
+                    _ = AXUIElementPerformAction(item.element, kAXPressAction as CFString)
+                }
+            }
+            DispatchQueue.main.asyncAfter(deadline: .now() + 2.45) {
+                MenuBarHider.shared.resume()
+            }
+            DispatchQueue.main.asyncAfter(deadline: .now() + 4.5) {
+                dumpWindows()
+            }
+            return
+        }
+
         if CommandLine.arguments.contains("--diag") {
             DispatchQueue.main.asyncAfter(deadline: .now() + 2.5) {
                 dumpMenuBarItems()

Sources/SimpleTopBar/MenuBarItems.swift

@@ -117,10 +117,11 @@ final class MenuBarItemManager: ObservableObject {
             return
         }
         hider.suspend()
-        DispatchQueue.main.asyncAfter(deadline: .now() + 0.18) {
+        DispatchQueue.main.asyncAfter(deadline: .now() + 0.2) {
             _ = self.performPress(item)
-            // Let the menu finish appearing before the bar contracts again.
+            // The menu is its own window, positioned at the item's on-screen
-            DispatchQueue.main.asyncAfter(deadline: .now() + 1.0) {
+            // spot, so the bar can be re-hidden almost immediately.
+            DispatchQueue.main.asyncAfter(deadline: .now() + 0.1) {
                 hider.resume()
             }
         }

Sources/SimpleTopBar/SelfTest.swift

@@ -1,5 +1,28 @@
 import AppKit
 import ApplicationServices
+import CoreGraphics
+
+/// Diagnostic used by `open SimpleTopBar.app --args --diag-press`. Presses a
+/// hidden item's accessibility element without revealing it and dumps the
+/// resulting high-level windows, to see where its menu actually opens.
+func dumpWindows() {
+    var lines: [String] = []
+    if let list = CGWindowListCopyWindowInfo([], kCGNullWindowID) as? [[String: Any]] {
+        for window in list {
+            let layer = window[kCGWindowLayer as String] as? Int ?? -1
+            guard layer > 20 else { continue }
+            let owner = window[kCGWindowOwnerName as String] as? String ?? "?"
+            let bounds = window[kCGWindowBounds as String] as? [String: Any] ?? [:]
+            let x = bounds["X"] as? Double ?? 0
+            let y = bounds["Y"] as? Double ?? 0
+            let width = bounds["Width"] as? Double ?? 0
+            let height = bounds["Height"] as? Double ?? 0
+            lines.append("\(owner) layer=\(layer) frame=\(Int(x)),\(Int(y)) \(Int(width))x\(Int(height))")
+        }
+    }
+    try? lines.joined(separator: "\n").write(toFile: "/tmp/simpletopbar-windows.txt", atomically: true, encoding: .utf8)
+    exit(0)
+}
 
 /// Diagnostic used by `open SimpleTopBar.app --args --dump-items`. Writes the
 /// live Accessibility view of the menu bar to /tmp so it can be inspected