Direct answers to the three complaints in one release.
"Doesn't load any results even if I type a keyword" — navigateTo used to
always append .bch to any bare label. So "bitcoin" became
https://bitcoin.bch/ and NXDOMAINed. Now: input with a space, or bare
label with no dot, routes to the user's chosen search engine. Input with
a dot (hello.bch, example.com) stays a URL. Matches Chrome/Firefox
omnibox behaviour exactly.
"Has no check for updates in settings" — new Updates section shows the
installed version + signing-cert SHA-256, with a "Check for updates now"
button that manually polls dl.silentmode.st and toasts the result. If a
newer version exists, the standard silent-prefetch → green-chip → tap-to
-install flow (unchanged from 0.15) kicks in.
"Looks poor compared to a regular browser" — Settings gains three more
sections beyond Resolution / Ariadne's Thread / Maintenance:
- Search: segmented picker for DuckDuckGo (default), Startpage, Brave
Search, Google, Kagi. Persists via SharedPreferences.
- Updates: version + cert + manual check.
- Privacy: "Clear browsing data" — cookies (CookieManager), form data,
cache, per-tab history, all in one tap. Bookmarks + tabs preserved.
- About: silentmode.st/theseus + theseus.x links, brand credit.
serveSettingsPage() signature grew to take (indexerOn, searchKey,
currentVersion) so it can render the current selection + version. Added
searchEngineSegment() helper for the picker layout.
Release: ariadne-v0.17.apk sha256
8a655081782ecc17a50a7fcd67c28625ccb0c905cf6b583bdd703a128b2b9b10
Deployed to dl.silentmode.st + silentmode.bch (Sia mirror). Site pages
bumped: silentmode.st/tools + /releases + /theseus + theseus.x.
Users on 0.15 reported "Ariadne can't open many websites" and "start page
is full of dead links". Two independent stale-data issues, both fixed.
Start page — replaces the featured-hero + beacon-fallback grid with the
same nine curated cards navigate.st serves (hello.bch, siatest.bch,
SilentMode.X, Theseus.X, Sirius.X, Hephaestus.X, Prometheus.X, Helios.X,
Hermes.X). No more auto-iteration over every registered name on the
beacon — which is what was surfacing smtest-dc5563.bch, uitest-e20579.p2p,
qrtest-e21970.nav etc. Added product-role badges (infrastructure /
navigator / registrar / code-host / app-store / search / messaging) with
the same acid/blue/purple/green/gold/pink vocabulary Theseus uses.
Bundled snapshot at app/assets/bns-index.json regenerated from the live
chain via the resolver-web.js buildIndex path. Up from 44 entries to 54,
now including all 13 .x names (was 6 — silentmode.x, theseus.x,
hephaestus.x, prometheus.x, helios.x, hermes.x etc. were entirely
missing). So cold-start resolution finds the .x brands without waiting
for a network trip.
Also regenerated dl.silentmode.st/bns-name-index.json — same 54-entry
JSON. That file hadn't been rebuilt since 2026-08-30 and is what every
client's CDN pull path reads on cold start (mobile, extension, resolver).
There's no timer that regenerates it; scratchpad/build-snapshot.mjs is
the reproducible one-shot: node build-snapshot.mjs <cdn-path>.
Sites updated in the same commit (all four surfaces need to advertise the
same version — silentmode.st/tools + /releases + /theseus + theseus.x
were still linking 0.15). APK also mirrored to bns/silentmode/ so
silentmode.bch/ariadne-v0.16.apk serves the same bytes.
Release: ariadne-v0.16.apk sha256
fa58aa7642319faaa6b23f0f0a46c0adad2ce1f3c5957f4d527ac09241b76574
Old links pointed users at ariadne-v0.11.apk from three separate pages
while the in-app auto-updater was already pulling 0.15. New downloaders
got 4 versions behind.
- site-theseus-x/index.html — v0.11 → v0.15, hash updated, meta noting
in-app auto-update. Sia-uploaded to bns/theseus/ so theseus.x reflects
it now.
- site/releases/index.html — bumps the Ariadne row from 0.11 to 0.15
with the new hash and a release note covering the DOWNLOADING/READY/
RETRY chip states shipped in 0.15.
- site/tools/index.html — same v0.11 → v0.15 bump. Also retitled from
"Theseus — Silent Mode" / "Theseus — the browsers" to "Tools — Silent
Mode" / "Silent Mode tools" because the page actually lists every
client (Theseus Win + Android, Ariadne extension, navigate.st relay,
Ariadne standalone Windows resolver) — a tools directory, not a
Theseus-dedicated page. Intro now points at /theseus/ for the
dedicated Theseus landing.
- site/theseus/ NEW — clearnet mirror of theseus.x. Same page, retitled
"Theseus Navigator — Silent Mode" with canonical URL pointing at
silentmode.st/theseus/. Users on the resolver reach theseus.x for the
same content trustlessly; the /theseus/ path is the always-reachable
fallback with a real cert. Also pushes the APK itself to
bns/silentmode/ so silentmode.bch/ariadne-v0.15.apk works too
(dl.silentmode.st and silentmode.bch now serve the same bytes with
identical SHA-256).
