reflector/REPORT.md

Fix: Daily.co UX & ICS Meeting Dedup

Branch: fix-daily-ux (worktree at .worktrees/fix-daily-ux) Base: main (1ce1c7a9)

Context / Incident

Feb 2, ~11:30 AM Montreal — user JLee reported being "kicked out / can't rejoin" Max's room. Screenshot showed "Failed to join meeting. try again." Two active meetings were visible with ~1s creation difference, plus one recently deactivated.

Root Cause Analysis

The kick: Exact cause unknown (server logs lost — container recreated ~Feb 3). eject_at_room_exp is NOT set on Daily rooms (defaults false), so room expiry did NOT eject users. Most likely a WebRTC connection drop or Daily.co infrastructure hiccup. After disconnection, rejoin failed because the meeting had passed end_date → join endpoint returned 400 "Meeting has ended" → frontend showed generic error.

The duplicate meetings: Max's room uses an aggregated ICS feed (user.fm) that merges Cal.com + Google Calendar. Every Cal.com booking appears twice with different ics_uid values — one @Cal.com, one UUID from Google Calendar. Reflector deduplicates by ics_uid, so it creates 2 calendar_event rows → 2 meetings → 2 Daily rooms. This is systematic and ongoing for every Cal.com booking. Proven with production DB data across Feb 2, 3, 5.

What's Done

Commit 1: e9e16764 — Daily.co error messages

File: www/app/[roomName]/components/DailyRoom.tsx

• Added frame.on("error", handler) for Daily.co DailyEventObjectFatalError events
• fatalError state + ref to distinguish forced disconnect from voluntary leave
• Specific error screens per error.type:
  • connection-error → "Connection lost" + "Try Rejoining" (page reload) + "Leave"
  • exp-room → "Meeting time has ended" + "Back to Room"
  • ejected → "You were removed" + "Back to Room"
  • fallback → shows errorMsg + "Back to Room"
• Join failure (joinMutation.isError) now shows actual API error detail via printApiError instead of generic message
• Added "Back to Room" button on join failure screen

Commit 2: 1da687fe — ICS meeting dedup

Files: server/reflector/db/meetings.py, server/reflector/worker/ics_sync.py, server/tests/test_ics_dedup.py

• MeetingController.get_by_room_and_time_window(room, start_date, end_date) — queries for existing active meeting with exact same room + start + end times
• In create_upcoming_meetings_for_event: after checking get_by_calendar_event, also checks get_by_room_and_time_window. If a meeting already exists for the same time slot, skips creation and logs it.
• 2 tests: dedup prevents duplicate, different times still create separate meetings. Both pass.

Commit 3: 238d7684 — Review fixes

• Import ApiError type instead of inline type literal in cast
• Move get_database import from inline to top-of-file in test

What's Left / Known Issues

Must fix: joinMutation.error as ApiError cast

In DailyRoom.tsx:404, the as ApiError cast is needed because openapi-react-query types the error based on the OpenAPI spec (which declares detail: ValidationError[] for all errors), but real 400 errors return { detail: "string" }. This is a known codebase-wide issue (see apiHooks.ts:12 XXX comment). The cast is safe at runtime (printApiError handles both string and array), but it's a type-level lie. Proper fix: either fix the OpenAPI error response schemas, or make printApiError accept unknown and do full runtime narrowing. Both are broader changes beyond this PR's scope.

Not tested (needs manual verification)

• Daily.co error event rendering — requires live Daily room in browser to trigger error events. Cannot be tested locally without a running meeting.
• The "Try Rejoining" button simply reloads the page. Could be improved to re-call the join endpoint directly without full reload.

Layer A (ICS feed config) not addressed

The dedup code fix (Layer B) prevents duplicate meetings, but the root cause is Max's aggregated calendar feed including both Cal.com and Google Calendar copies. Configuring the ICS URL to point directly at Cal.com's feed (or deduplicating at the feed level) would eliminate the duplicate calendar_event rows too. This is a user configuration change, not a code change.

Dedup edge case: shared rooms

The dedup check uses exact (room_id, start_date, end_date) match. For shared rooms where multiple people could legitimately book the same time slot, this could incorrectly skip a valid meeting. Currently not an issue since Max's room is personal, but worth noting if this logic is applied broadly. Could add a guard like if not room.is_shared if needed.

No DB index for dedup query

get_by_room_and_time_window queries on (room_id, start_date, end_date, is_active). Existing idx_meeting_room_id index on room_id is sufficient for current scale. No composite index added.

Files Changed (total: +315/-4)

www/app/[roomName]/components/DailyRoom.tsx  — +93 (error event handling, error UIs)
server/reflector/db/meetings.py              — +21 (get_by_room_and_time_window)
server/reflector/worker/ics_sync.py          — +17/-2 (dedup check before meeting creation)
server/tests/test_ics_dedup.py               — +186 (new test file, 2 tests)