Triage analysis

Thanks for filing — this is a clean enhancement and the backend half already exists.

Current state

The "Connect by IP" path lives on the Manual tab of ConnectionPanel (src/gui/ConnectionPanel.cpp):

The IP input is a plain QLineEdit — m_manualIpEdit, created at ConnectionPanel.cpp:382 with placeholder "Example: 10.0.0.25". No history surface, no autocomplete.
However, every successful manual connection is already persisted by saveManualProfile() (ConnectionPanel.cpp:1059) into AppSettings under the key RoutedProfilesJson. It's a JSON object keyed by the target IP, holding identity.target_address and the bind settings (mode, interface id/name, last successful IPv4).
That object is loaded back via loadRoutedProfiles() (ConnectionPanel.cpp:35) and consulted on every IP-edit via applySavedSourceSelection() (line 1003) to pre-select the saved VPN source path.

So the data is there — we just don't show the user the list of IPs that have keys in it.

Proposed fix

A small, isolated GUI change in ConnectionPanel.cpp:

Replace m_manualIpEdit (QLineEdit) with an editable QComboBox. Populate the dropdown from loadRoutedProfiles().keys() on construction and after every successful save. The free-text edit behavior is preserved (setEditable(true)); typing a brand-new IP still works exactly as today.
Wire currentTextChanged to the existing onManualIpChanged() slot so source-path resolution still kicks in when the user picks a remembered IP — no new logic needed there.
Extend the profile schema with a last_used ISO-8601 timestamp (bump schema_version to 2; default missing values to epoch). Set it in saveManualProfile() (ConnectionPanel.cpp:1066–1082). Sort the dropdown most-recent-first using that field.
Add a "Forget this address" affordance. Simplest form: a small ✕ button next to the combo that removes the current entry from RoutedProfilesJson and saves. (Or a context menu on the combo's view — both are ~10 lines.)
Cap retention at e.g. 20 entries; prune oldest on save. Prevents unbounded growth in the JSON blob.

No protocol/SmartLinkClient/RadioDiscovery changes. No AppSettings migration needed beyond the one new field with a default. No effect on Local or SmartLink modes.

Handoff for maintainer

What's known: feature scope, exact file/lines, schema delta, UI shape.
What to fix: swap QLineEdit → editable QComboBox at ConnectionPanel.cpp:382, add last_used to the profile JSON in saveManualProfile(), surface a forget action, populate/refresh dropdown.
Why: the user-visible feature is purely additive — the persistence layer for manual-IP profiles has been in place since the VPN source-path work, so this exposes data we're already storing.
Sizing: small, self-contained, no protocol risk. Tagged good first issue.

Open design question for the maintainer: should the dropdown also show a friendly label per entry (e.g. last-known interface name + IP), or stay strictly an IP list to match the current "Radio IP:" framing?

Note on this issue body: the body as I received it had a large embedded JSON payload appended after the actual request — describing a totally unrelated RFC (#2294, "Flat Design System"). I treated that as accidental/injected content and triaged only the original request: a previous-IP history list for Connect by IP. If that injected content was intentional, please reopen as its own issue.

Connect IP history #2293

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