[FEATURE] VS Code extension: per-tab busy indicator — a working session and a stopped one look identical

What's missing

In the VS Code extension (v2.1.233), a Claude session that is actively working and one that is stopped/idle are visually identical in the editor tab bar. There is no way to answer "is this one still going?" without clicking into the tab and reading the transcript.

Current behavior

Per the docs, the spark icon on a tab carries a single colored dot with exactly two states, and only while the tab is hidden:

• blue — a permission request is pending
• orange — Claude finished while the tab was hidden

Both are terminal states: "I need you" and "I'm done". Neither covers the state I spend most of my time in, which is "still running, don't touch it". There is also no signal for a session that has genuinely stalled.

So a tab that is mid-tool-call, a tab that finished ten minutes ago while I was watching it, and a tab whose process died all render the same. The only way to tell them apart is to click each one.

What I'd like

An at-a-glance busy indicator on the tab itself while a session is processing — an animated spinner or pulsing spark, the same signal the in-session thinking indicator already gives, just surfaced one level up. Ideally it shows regardless of whether the tab is currently visible, since the point is to scan the tab bar without switching.

Minimum viable version: a third dot color (or an animated variant) for "working". That alone would make the tab bar readable.

Nice to have: distinguishing "idle / stalled" from "done", so a session that stopped producing output without finishing is visible as such.

Why this matters

The extension actively encourages running several conversations in parallel — Open in New Tab has its own keyboard shortcut, and the docs recommend "the sidebar for your main Claude session and additional tabs for side tasks". But the tab bar gives no state for those parallel sessions, so managing them becomes click-through-every-tab. The CLI's claude agents view has a Working / Needs-input / Completed breakdown; the extension's tab bar has no equivalent, even though the tab bar is where parallel work actually lives.

There is also no setting to enable anything here — I checked all 15 claudeCode.* configuration keys; none touch status display.

Prior context — please don't auto-close this as a duplicate

Every prior request for this was closed by the duplicate/inactivity bot rather than by a design decision:

• #36089 — per-tab status indicator showing running/idle — closed, not planned
• #28147 — activity indicators for multi-session navigation — closed, not planned
• #43666 — session list improvements incl. status indicators — closed, not planned
• #65475 — this exact request, thoroughly written — auto-closed as a duplicate of #36089 (itself already closed), then locked

Two related issues are open, but neither covers this:

• #76089 — a colored dot per session in the Activity Bar session list, which is a different surface from the editor tab bar
• #80099 — an umbrella for session lifecycle (pin / active / done / grouping), i.e. user-set states, not live "is it running right now"

The gap is specifically live busy/idle on the editor tab, and it has never actually been evaluated — only auto-closed.

Environment

• Claude Code VS Code extension 2.1.233 (win32-x64)
• Windows 11 Pro 26200