BiRefNet-Lite times out on first load (~60s+ for 973MB model).
U2-Net works in 2 seconds. Users can still select BiRefNet for
higher quality when they're willing to wait. Added timing hints
in model descriptions and increased timeout for BiRefNet models.
The bridge.ts catch block was catching ALL errors from the venv Python
and falling back to system python3. This masked real script errors
(like rembg model loading failures) by reporting "rembg not installed"
from the system python3 fallback. Now only falls back on ENOENT (venv
binary not found).
- Switch default from birefnet-general (973MB, 4min) to
birefnet-general-lite (faster, still SOTA quality)
- Fix Python script stdout pollution — progress messages now go to
stderr so the JSON result parser doesn't break
- Pre-download birefnet-general-lite in Docker build
- Switch default model from U2-Net to BiRefNet (state-of-the-art)
- Add 6 model options: BiRefNet, BiRefNet Lite, BiRefNet Portrait,
BRIA RMBG, IS-Net, U2-Net
- Add animated progress bar with stage indicators (loading model,
analyzing, removing, refining edges) and elapsed timer
- Add intuitive background color presets (Transparent, White, Black,
Red, Green, Blue) as clickable buttons + custom color picker
- Handle background color compositing in Python (PIL alpha composite)
- Add checkerboard pattern to before/after slider for transparency
- Pre-bake BiRefNet model (973MB) in Docker image for instant use
- Add user management endpoints (register, list, delete, change password)
- Add API key management (create, list, delete)
- Add settings persistence endpoints (get, put)
- Wire settings dialog to real backend (People, API Keys, System, Security)
- Fix login auth flow (window.location.href for full reload)
- Fix download URLs returning 401 (make public since UUIDs are unguessable)
- Fix border tool shadowColor validation (accept 6-8 hex digits)
- Fix remove-bg alpha matting fallback (retry without on failure)
- Fix AI tool silent fallbacks (report errors instead of no-ops)
- Add checkerboard background to before/after slider for transparency
- Add progress bars to all AI tool components
- Add Playwright E2E test suite (131 tests across 9 test files)
- Rewrite Dockerfile for production (tsx runtime, pre-baked AI models)
- Add .dockerignore for faster builds
- Add proper accessible labels to login form
Siddharth Kumar Sah