[FEATURE] Support persistent virtual environment activation

Preflight Checklist

• [x] I have searched existing requests and this feature hasn't been requested yet
• [x] This is a single feature request (not multiple features)

Problem Statement

I have Claude Code for VS Code (2.0.5).
When working with Python projects that use virtual environments, Claude Code requires the venv to be activated separately for each command execution.
This creates significant friction and performance overhead in typical development workflows.

Current Behavior

Each Bash tool invocation starts a fresh shell session with no environment state from previous commands. This means:

# Command 1: Activate venv
source /path/to/venv/bin/activate

# Command 2: Run tests - venv is NOT activated
pytest test_file.py  # ❌ Uses system Python, not venv Python

Proposed Solution

Claude Code should support one of the following:
Option A: Maintain a persistent shell session that preserves environment state across commands
Option B: Detect and automatically activate venv when present in the project (similar to VS Code's Python extension)
Option C: Allow shell initialization scripts (like .bashrc or project-specific setup) to run once per conversation

Alternative Solutions

In settings

Claude Code: Use Terminal
[x] Launch Claude in the terminal instead of the native UI

Priority

Medium - Would be very helpful

Feature Category

CLI commands and flags

Use Case Example

_No response_

Additional Context

_No response_