## Houston 0.4.6

The "first run that feels like a game" release. Houston now opens with a guided tutorial that gets a brand-new user from cold app launch to a real, working assistant in under a minute, no form-filling, no docs. This is also the first cut that ships natively on Windows, the first one with a real Settings rail, the first one with a Sign-out button on connected providers, and the first one with the Outbound cold-email agent in the store.

### What's new

- **Video-game-style first-run tutorial.** Replaces the old form-based onboarding with a guided flow: name your assistant, sign in to your AI provider, sign in to Composio so the agent has tools, then run a real chat against it. The "Try it" mission isn't a demo, it kicks off a real mission via the same chat surface used everywhere else, so the conversation lives on the Activity board and survives once the tutorial is done. Predefined chips (morning brief, meeting prep, weekly recap) make the first message zero-effort.
- **Inline Composio sign-in card in chat.** When the agent tries to call a tool that needs Composio and you're not signed in, it posts a connect card directly in the conversation. One click, you're authenticated, the agent retries. Mirrors the existing per-toolkit connect-card pattern so users never get bounced out to Settings to recover.
- **Workspace UI tour.** After graduation, a coachmark tour walks you through the agents area, tabs (Activity, Routines, Files, Job Description), Mission Control, Integrations, and the new "Guide me" pill in the tab bar. Replayable any time from that pill.
- **Settings has a proper sidebar.** The long-scrolling settings page is gone. Account, Workspace, Provider, Appearance, Language, Timezone, Connect phone, and Danger zone each live in their own section with one-click left-rail navigation.
- **Sign out from Codex and Claude Code.** Connected provider cards now have a "Sign out" link. It runs the official CLI logout command (`claude auth logout` clears the macOS Keychain entry, `codex logout` revokes the ChatGPT refresh token server-side), then re-surfaces the login flow inline.
- **Outbound agent in the store.** A new agent that runs the LinkedIn to Apollo to Instantly cold-email pipeline end-to-end. Find leads on LinkedIn, enrich via Apollo, send via Instantly, all from one chat.
- **Connect phone moved into Settings.** The phone-pairing QR, connection state, and the disconnect-all-phones reset now live together inside Settings under a BETA pill, instead of hanging off the global sidebar.
- **Improved agent sidebar.** Sidebar item rows pick up the work refactor from the new SidebarSectionNav, with cleaner spacing and active-state treatment.

### Native Windows build

- **Houston for Windows** ships as a signed-by-minisign MSI installer alongside the Mac DMG. Same agent, same engine, same chat surface. Composio, codex, and claude-code all run as native Windows executables. No WSL, no Docker, no terminal anywhere in the install or first-run path.
- **In-app auto-update on Windows.** Once you're on a Houston for Windows build, future versions arrive the same way they do on Mac: a notification in the app, one click to install, automatic relaunch.
- **Windows first-run hardening.** Sign-in opens the OAuth URL through `cmd /C start` instead of macOS `open` (Windows users could not get past the sign-in screen before). The engine spawns with `CREATE_NEW_PROCESS_GROUP` so the parent app's console events stop killing the subprocess every couple of minutes (`STATUS_CONTROL_C_EXIT`). The bundled CLI resolver knows the MSI install layout, so claude-code and composio are found instead of silently skipped. Composio's first-time login writes your API key to the Windows Credential Manager via the same FFI-against-native-APIs pattern Houston uses on the macOS Keychain. No plaintext on disk.
- **Project moved to the gethouston org.** `github.com/ja-818/houston` is now `github.com/gethouston/houston`. The old URL still redirects, so existing clones, forks, and updater endpoints keep working.

### Reliability

- **Sessions no longer die at the first message** when an unrelated copy of Claude Code lives elsewhere on your computer. Houston now talks directly to the version it manages itself, which is always kept in sync with what Houston was tested against. Previously, an older `claude` install on the same machine could intercept the call and reject newer flags, surfacing as a vague "app error."
- **Auth errors are actually visible.** Sign-in surfaces post-callback OAuth failures inline with human-readable messages (the common AADSTS codes plus Supabase identity-collision errors are mapped to actionable sentences) instead of silently logging.
- **Updater uses the same minisign signing key for both OSes.** The signing key controls who can ship updates to existing Houston installs, regardless of platform.

### Before you upgrade

- **Mac:** quit Houston before installing. macOS does not always replace a running app cleanly. If in doubt, remove `/Applications/Houston.app` and drag the new copy in.
- **Windows (first install):** the MSI is not yet OS-code-signed (SignPath integration ships in a follow-up). You'll see a SmartScreen warning the first time. Click "More info" then "Run anyway." Once installed, future auto-updates run from a trusted parent process and don't show the warning.

### If you are on 0.4.4 or 0.4.5 (Mac)

Houston should detect 0.4.6, download it, install it, and relaunch into the new version on its own.

### If you are on 0.4.2 or earlier (Mac)

Auto-update will not pull you forward from those builds. Quit Houston, drag a fresh DMG over `/Applications/Houston.app`, and reopen. After that one manual step you are back on the healthy updater path and future versions apply automatically.

### Known limitations

- **Windows ARM64 not yet shipped.** v0.4.6 is x64-only on Windows. ARM64 (Surface Pro X, etc.) is on the roadmap once we have demand to justify the second build pipeline.
- **Windows MSI not yet OS-code-signed.** SignPath Foundation integration is the next Windows-side PR. Until then, expect one SmartScreen "Run anyway" click on first install only.
- **"Continue with Microsoft" sign-in is hidden** for this release while we reconcile the Supabase Azure provider with the production callback URL. Google sign-in is unaffected.
- **Mobile companion is still beta.** Expect occasional reconnect hiccups. Keep your Mac awake while using it.
