From 778d7d3f12938c1d15d7b9a78aa7a361523a0060 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: =?UTF-8?q?Andr=C3=A9=20Padez?= <andre.padez@gmail.com>
Date: Wed, 26 Aug 2026 18:32:29 +0000
Subject: [PATCH] the reader reads the param the platform actually passes
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clicking a message did nothing. the reading pane stayed on "Select an email to
read" whatever you opened, and it had been that way since email became a plugin.

the reader asks the URL which message is open. it asked for `emailId`, which was
the param name back when email was part of the platform and declared its own
`/email/:emailId` route. a plugin declares no routes: the platform mounts every
one at `<route>` and `<route>/:section`, so the id arrives as `section`. asking
for `emailId` got undefined, `selectedId` was null on every render, and the pane
rendered its empty state.

nothing else was wrong, which is why this took so long to place — the list
showed, the link navigated, the URL changed, and both API routes return full
data (verified against the real 19k-message store: /messages carries every
snippet, /thread/:id returns 55KB of html). one undefined param, and the whole
right-hand side of the screen looked dead.

still accepts `emailId`, so this keeps working if email ever gets its own route
again. the underlying smell is the platform naming a plugin's param for it —
worth fixing there, not here.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Officer-Session: 656f5c85-e49a-4f1f-b9f3-042a04b4d043
---
 web/shared.ts | 21 ++++++++++++++++++---
 1 file changed, 18 insertions(+), 3 deletions(-)

diff --git a/web/shared.ts b/web/shared.ts
index d154d4a..b9090a3 100644
--- a/web/shared.ts
+++ b/web/shared.ts
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 import { useParams } from 'react-router';
 
-// Which email is open is `/email/:emailId`. The route pair already existed, but the URL was a mirror
+// Which email is open is `/email/:id`. The route pair already existed, but the URL was a mirror
 // rather than the state: the selection lived in an `EMAIL_SELECTED` global and two effects copied it
 // back and forth with the route. That round-trip is what kept a row a `<button>` — nothing to link to,
 // no cmd-click, no middle-click — and it meant Back raced the effect that had just written the URL
@@ -9,5 +9,20 @@ import { useParams } from 'react-router';
 /** `search` carries the folder you are reading in (`?folder=sent`), which a bare pathname would drop. */
 export const emailPath = (id: string, search = '') => `/email/${encodeURIComponent(id)}${search}`;
 
-/** The open email, or null on the bare `/email` route — which is a real state, not one to redirect away. */
-export const useSelectedEmailId = (): string | null => useParams<{ emailId?: string }>().emailId ?? null;
+/**
+ * The open email, or null on the bare `/email` route — which is a real state, not one to redirect away.
+ *
+ * ── Why it reads `section` ──
+ *
+ * This asked for `emailId` while email was part of the platform and had its own `/email/:emailId` route.
+ * A plugin does not declare its routes: the platform mounts every one at `<route>` and `<route>/:section`,
+ * so the param arrives under the platform's name whatever the plugin means by it. Asking for `emailId`
+ * got `undefined` from the day email became a plugin — the reader then had no selection to show and sat on
+ * "Select an email to read" however many messages you clicked, with the list and the API both working.
+ *
+ * `emailId` is still accepted so the hook keeps working if this ever mounts under its own route again.
+ */
+export const useSelectedEmailId = (): string | null => {
+  const params = useParams<{ section?: string; emailId?: string }>();
+  return params.emailId ?? params.section ?? null;
+};