Channels plugin: inbound messages silently not delivered without --channels flag at startup

Summary

When using plugin:imessage@claude-plugins-official or plugin:telegram@claude-plugins-official, installing the plugin and running Claude Code without the --channels flag causes a silent failure: the bun MCP servers start, tools are registered and callable, but inbound channel messages are never delivered to Claude. There is no error, no warning, and no indication anything is wrong.

The fix is to start Claude with --channels plugin:imessage@claude-plugins-official — but this is not discoverable and the gap between "installed" and "listening" is completely invisible.

Steps to Reproduce

1. Install iMessage or Telegram plugin via Claude Code
2. Start Claude Code without the --channels flag (e.g. claude --dangerously-skip-permissions)
3. Send a message from iPhone/Telegram to the bot
4. Nothing happens — no message delivered, no error shown

Expected Behavior

Either:

• Claude Code should warn that installed channel plugins require --channels to receive inbound messages, or
• The plugin should work without requiring a separate flag at startup, or
• Startup output should clearly show which channels are/aren't actively listening

Actual Behavior

• Bun processes start, MCP tools are registered — everything looks healthy
• Inbound messages are silently dropped / never delivered
• No log output, no warning, no indication the channel isn't listening

Impact

This caused multiple hours of debugging. The symptom looked like a permissions issue, a bun bug, a chat.db access issue, etc. The actual cause (--channels flag missing) is nowhere surfaced.

Suggested Fix

On startup, if channel plugins are installed but --channels was not passed for them, print a warning:
iMessage plugin installed but not listening — restart with --channels plugin:imessage@claude-plugins-official to receive messages

Or document this clearly in the plugin install confirmation message.

Environment

• Claude Code version: 2.1.89
• OS: macOS 26.3 (Darwin 25.3.0), M4 Mac Mini
• Plugins: plugin:imessage@claude-plugins-official, plugin:telegram@claude-plugins-official