todo: group the url and query-string items into one theme

files-app becomes url-state: the file browser is where the work happened, but where
selection lives and who clears a query string are framework questions. The panel
framework's version of the same question moves in beside them, extracted from the
deep-read item, which keeps it as one of its three questions.

Item ids changed with the theme. Done now deliberately — no board reads them yet, and
this is the last cheap moment to move one.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

TODO.md

@@ -20,7 +20,7 @@ the owner's OS user and can never be granted. Indirection there really is accide
 
 ## Themes
 
-**77 open, 20 closed**, across 28 themes.
+**78 open, 20 closed**, across 28 themes.
 
 | Theme                                                                                      | Open | Closed |
 | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ | ---- | ------ |
@@ -32,7 +32,6 @@ the owner's OS user and can never be granted. Indirection there really is accide
 | [Code editor](todo/code-editor/)                                                           | 1    | 0      |
 | [Components — the shared UI layer](todo/components/)                                       | 1    | 0      |
 | [File watchers](todo/file-watchers/)                                                       | 1    | 0      |
-| [Files app — routing](todo/files-app/)                                                     | 3    | 0      |
 | [Fleet — one command across every server](todo/fleet/)                                     | 3    | 0      |
 | [Headscale](todo/headscale/)                                                               | 0    | 5      |
 | [Infra (alpha)](todo/infra/)                                                               | 6    | 0      |
@@ -50,6 +49,7 @@ the owner's OS user and can never be granted. Indirection there really is accide
 | [Sudo terminal modal](todo/sudo-terminal-modal/)                                           | 1    | 0      |
 | [Tooling — the list about the list](todo/tooling/)                                         | 1    | 0      |
 | [Transmission](todo/transmission/)                                                         | 6    | 0      |
+| [URL state — routing, query strings and selection](todo/url-state/)                        | 4    | 0      |
 | [Waiting on the owner to run it](todo/waiting-on-owner/)                                   | 2    | 0      |
 | [Workspaces & Panels](todo/workspaces-panels/)                                             | 2    | 0      |
 

todo/url-state/_index.md

@@ -1,9 +1,17 @@
 ---
-theme: files-app
+theme: url-state
-heading: "Files app — routing"
+heading: "URL state — routing, query strings and selection"
 kind: theme
 ---
 
+**Grouped 2026-08-21.** This was `files-app`, and the file browser is still where most of it is —
+but the question underneath is not the file browser's. Where selection lives, what a query string is
+allowed to mean, and who is responsible for clearing one are framework questions that happen to have
+been answered first in `/files`. The panel framework's own version of the same question is here too,
+rather than filed under the framework's deep read where nobody comparing the two would find it.
+
+`docs/navigation-audit.md` is the authority for all of it.
+
 **The URL model is done (2026-08-15).** The folder is the pathname —
 `/files/archive/Tests/platform/docs` — and `?view=` is a NAME within it, not a second copy of the path.
 Deep links and refresh work, which they never had. Landed across `559560de`, `98ba604a`, `7e31564c`,

todo/url-state/a-panel-s-folder-is-still-not-addressable.md

@@ -1,7 +1,7 @@
 ---
-id: files-app/a-panel-s-folder-is-still-not-addressable
+id: url-state/a-panel-s-folder-is-still-not-addressable
 title: "A panel's folder is still not addressable"
-theme: files-app
+theme: url-state
 status: open
 created: 2026-08-20
 date_source: assumed

todo/url-state/can-the-query-strings-come-out-of-the-flow.md

@@ -0,0 +1,29 @@
+---
+id: url-state/can-the-query-strings-come-out-of-the-flow
+title: "Can the query strings come out of the flow?"
+theme: url-state
+status: open
+created: 2026-08-20
+date_source: assumed
+order: 4
+---
+
+**Can the query strings come out of the flow?** One of the three questions the Workspace/Panel deep
+read set out to answer rather than assume (`workspaces-panels/a-deep-read-of-the-whole-framework-to`),
+pulled out to sit beside the file browser's version of the same problem — which is the only place the
+question has actually been worked through end to end.
+
+What makes it a real question rather than a tidy-up: a query string is doing several different jobs at
+once across the app. In `/files` it names the open overlay (`?view=<name>`), which is addressable state
+and belongs in the URL. `src/workspaces/components/NavLink.tsx` appends a **global** query string to
+every link it renders — a different job again, and one most callers never think about. And
+`docs/navigation-audit.md` prescribes `?selected=<id>` for a master list with a live preview, because
+the detail route is the full page.
+
+So "come out of the flow" is not one change. Deciding which of those uses are load-bearing addressable
+state and which are ambient plumbing being carried around is the work, and the answer probably differs
+per case.
+
+Related, and the reason this theme exists: `url-state/the-acts-that-clear-the-overlay-have-no-owner`
+is the same shape one layer down — the params are named in one place, but every site still decides for
+itself whether to honour them.

todo/url-state/rows-are-still-not-links.md

@@ -1,7 +1,7 @@
 ---
-id: files-app/rows-are-still-not-links
+id: url-state/rows-are-still-not-links
 title: "Rows are still not links"
-theme: files-app
+theme: url-state
 status: open
 created: 2026-08-20
 date_source: assumed

todo/url-state/the-acts-that-clear-the-overlay-have-no-owner.md

@@ -1,7 +1,7 @@
 ---
-id: files-app/the-acts-that-clear-the-overlay-have-no-owner
+id: url-state/the-acts-that-clear-the-overlay-have-no-owner
 title: "The acts that clear the overlay have no owner, only the list does"
-theme: files-app
+theme: url-state
 status: open
 created: 2026-08-20
 date_source: assumed

todo/workspaces-panels/a-deep-read-of-the-whole-framework-to.md

@@ -14,6 +14,9 @@ repeatedly, and nobody has since sat down and read the whole thing at once.
 Three questions to answer rather than assume: can the query strings come out of the flow; is there
 a better shape for panel-to-panel communication than the current channel/URL split; and what does
 the layout tree cost that a simpler one would not.
+The first of those now has its own item, `url-state/can-the-query-strings-come-out-of-the-flow`,
+filed with the file browser's work on the same question — that is where it has been thought about
+hardest. It stays part of this read; it is not a separate effort.
 **Fold the existing panel items into this** — the silent `key`/`appType` mismatch, the destructive
 layout migration on a renamed key, and `docs/workspace-panel-todo.md`. They are symptoms of the
 same unexamined design, and fixing them one at a time is how it stays unexamined.