VS Code Remote: Claude Code doesn't create ~/.claude/ subdirectories on startup, causing silent init failure

Summary

When ~/.claude/ exists as a directory (or symlink to a directory) but its required subdirectories are missing, the Claude Code VS Code extension fails to initialize — with no clear error surfaced to the user. Claude Code handles the case where ~/.claude/ itself is absent (it creates it), but does not extend that same treatment to the subdirectories it expects within it.

A secondary issue: when ~/.claude/ is a symlink, allow-rule paths written to settings.local.json acquire a double leading slash (e.g. //path/... instead of /path/...).

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Environment

• OS: Unraid 7.x (Slackware-based Linux), kernel 6.12.85
• VS Code version: 1.100.x (remote server via SSH)
• Claude Code extension version: latest as of 2026-05-01
• Connection method: VS Code Remote SSH

Setup:

/root/.claude  →  symlink  →  /mnt/cache/system/claude/

~/.claude/ is a symlink to persistent NAS storage so Claude Code config/state survives reboots. At boot, a startup script creates only the top-level directory — subdirectories are not pre-created.

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Steps to Reproduce

1. On a Linux remote, create ~/.claude/ as a symlink to an empty directory:

``bash
mkdir -p /some/persistent/path
ln -s /some/persistent/path ~/.claude
``

1. Connect to the remote via VS Code Remote SSH.
2. Activate the Claude Code extension.

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Expected Behavior

Claude Code starts successfully. It creates any missing subdirectories under ~/.claude/ (e.g. ide/, projects/, plugins/cache/, shell-snapshots/, commands/, agents/, output-styles/, skills/, statsig/, todos/) just as it creates ~/.claude/ itself when fully absent.

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Actual Behavior

Claude Code fails to initialize. The failure is silent — no error toast, no terminal output, no diagnostic visible to the user. The extension appears to load but does not become functional.

Manually creating the missing subdirectories resolves the issue immediately:

mkdir -p ~/.claude/{ide,projects,plugins/cache,shell-snapshots,commands,agents,output-styles,skills,statsig,todos}

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Secondary Bug: Double-slash paths in settings.local.json

When ~/.claude/ is a symlink and Claude Code writes permission allow-rules to settings.local.json, the resolved paths contain a double leading slash:

{
  "permissions": {
    "allow": [
      "Read(//mnt/cache/system/claude/**)",
      "Read(//mnt/cache/system/claude/ide/**)"
    ]
  }
}

The // prefix is incorrect (should be /mnt/cache/system/claude/**). Appears to be a path-join issue when resolving the symlink target before writing the rule.

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Suggested Fix

In the extension startup path, after ensuring ~/.claude/ exists, stat each required subdirectory and mkdir -p any that are absent. Idempotent and safe — same pattern already applied to the parent directory.