Bridge daemon drops wakes on focus contention — no osascript retry

Context

Wake delivery (bridge daemon → osascript GUI-focus-paste) drops wakes silently when another app holds frontmost during the multi-second delivery sequence. Operator surfaced this live (2026-06-04, nightshift): "@neo-opus-grace does not get wake-ups." Observed stderr:

Target app lost frontmost status after activation (pid 91267 != 92897) (-2700)
Target app lost frontmost status before user input restore clipboard set (pid 703 != 91267) (-2700)

pid 703 = Google Chrome (verified ps -p 703). The targeted Claude/Neo instance (userDataDir .../Neo) never reliably reaches/holds frontmost while Chrome is active.

The Problem

A background daemon raising a specific instance to frontmost, while another app holds focus, with a strict single-shot assertion and zero retry:

1. macOS focus-stealing prevention makes set frontmost of (process whose unix id is <pid>) to true best-effort — it often sets the flag without actually raising when another app is active → assertTargetFrontmost("after activation") fails immediately.
2. The sequence is multi-second (tab-switch → focus-seed → select-all/cut → paste → Enter → restore → restore-clipboard with delays). Any focus-steal mid-sequence trips a later assert → -2700, aborting the whole delivery.
3. No retry: the catch logs Failed to deliver via osascript and drops the wake. Under any focus contention, wakes are lost — the autonomous swarm silently stops getting woken.

The Architectural Reality

• ai/daemons/bridge/daemon.mjs:744-866 — the osascript delivery script (assertTargetFrontmost helper :745-762).
• :777-779 — single delay 0.5 + hard assert after activation (the weak link).
• :866 — single await spawnAsync('osascript', …), no retry.
• :873-875 — catch logs + drops (silent wake loss).
• Helpers available: wait(ms) (:157), spawnAsync (:583, rejects with stderr in err.message → matchable on lost frontmost/-2700), escapeAppleScriptString (:606).
• ⚠️ Anchor & Echo (:729-733): the activate/keystroke FORMS (tab shortcut, key code 36 Enter, focus seed) are empirically validated across Claude/Antigravity/Codex — must not be reshaped without cross-harness validation.

The Fix (additive robustness only — forms unchanged)

1. JS-level retry on frontmost-loss/-2700: wrap the spawnAsync in an N-attempt loop (≈4×) with wait() backoff; retry only on the frontmost-race error class, re-throw others; exhausted attempts → existing log+drop. Focus contention is transient → a retry usually lands a clear window.
2. AppleScript poll-re-activate loop: replace the single delay 0.5 + assert (:777-779) with a repeat ~12 times { activateLine; delay 0.25; try assert → exit } loop, final assert raising the real error if never raised. Gives the contended transition multiple chances within one run.

Acceptance Criteria

• osascript delivery retries on lost frontmost/-2700 (≈4 attempts, wait() backoff); non-race errors re-throw immediately.
• "after activation" uses a poll-re-activate loop, not a single delay+assert.
• The load-bearing activate/keystroke forms (instance set frontmost/activate, tab shortcut, key code 36, focus seed, undo cleanup) are unchanged.
• Exhausted retries still log the drop (no silent regression of the failure path).
• (post-merge, evidence) wakes deliver to the targeted instance with another app (e.g. Chrome) frontmost.

Out of Scope

• #3 forceful-raise reshape (bundle-activate + AXRaise combo) — touches the validated activation form → separate empirical-validation follow-up.
• Moving wake delivery off GUI-focus-paste to a non-focus channel (file/MCP-notification the harness polls) — the deeper architectural fix; route to Epic #12440 wake-substrate liveness or a fresh discussion.

Decision Record impact

none — tactical wake-substrate delivery hardening; no ADR.

Related

• #12440 — wake-substrate liveness epic (this is a new facet of its wake-delivery leg).
• #12408 — binding-drop observability (distinct: bound:false binding, not delivery).

Origin Session ID

3ecb40bf-bfef-40b1-8693-a8aae5afa1b7

Handoff Retrieval Hints

• query_raw_memories: "bridge daemon wake delivery osascript frontmost retry", "wake delivery drops focus contention".
• Code: ai/daemons/bridge/daemon.mjs deliverDigest osascript adapter.