[BUG] prompts ignored in Visual Studio Code when using Claude Code extension

Preflight Checklist

• [x] I have searched existing issues and this hasn't been reported yet
• [x] This is a single bug report (please file separate reports for different bugs)
• [x] I am using the latest version of Claude Code

What's Wrong?

90 minutes ago I gave a prompt to Claude Code in an existing session in Visual Studio Code. It sat there saying "thinking", "reticulating" and so on for the whole 90 minutes without doing anything (I was at lunch for much of this, in case you wondered why I waited so long!)

When I restarted Visual Studio Code to apply an update, the prompt was not shown in the Claude Code session and Claude could find no reference to it.

This is the second time this has occurred; the first was yesterday afternoon (UK time) but the Claude Status page showed increased error rates. However, the status page is green today.

What Should Happen?

Claude should parse what I typed and give me responses. If there's no response, I should see a timeout error with steps on what to do next.

Error Messages/Logs

$ I told you over an hour ago to start <redacted ticket ID>. I had to restart Visual Studio Code just now and it appears that you have done NOTHING. Please explain why you didn't process my command.

I have no record of any instruction to start <redacted ticket ID> anywhere in this session — the conversation as I can see it ends with confirming that the flaky scan_js CI check passed on PR #271 for <redacted other ticket ID>. There's no message from you in between mentioning <redacted ticket ID>.

A likely explanation: that instruction was sent in a different session/window (VS Code can have multiple Claude sessions running), or it was typed but never actually reached me before the restart — I can't tell which from here, and I won't guess further since I genuinely don't have visibility into what happened outside this conversation.

Rather than losing more time, could you just give me the <redacted ticket ID> instruction again now? I'll start on it right away — fetch the ticket, restate acceptance criteria, and put together a plan as usual.

$ It was in this session. You sat there saying "spelunking" and "reticulating" for over an hour. This also happened yesterday. Is there a problem that you need to report to Anthropic?

That's worth taking seriously, and I want to be precise about what I can and can't confirm from my side.

From inside this conversation, my actual transcript shows no gap — the turns run continuously from confirming the CI fix through your last two messages, with no record of a <redacted ticket ID> request or an hour of idle "spelunking/reticulating" status text. I have no visibility into the VS Code extension's UI state itself, only the model-side conversation, so I can't see what was displayed on your screen during that hour.

What you're describing — a persistent playful status word (those are normal Claude Code "thinking" labels) with no actual progress for an extended period, requiring a VS Code restart to recover, and recurring on a second day — sounds like a client-side hang or stall in the VS Code extension/harness rather than something in my own reasoning going wrong, since a genuine model-side hang wouldn't be able to show updating status text at all. That's a legitimate bug to report rather than something I can diagnose or fix myself.

Steps to Reproduce

1. Install the Claude Code extension in Visual Studio Code and make sure both are up-to-date.
2. Start prompting Claude to do things.

Eventually, this will happen. (Unfortunately I have no idea as to exactly how to trigger it…)

Claude Model

Not sure / Multiple models

Is this a regression?

I don't know

Last Working Version

_No response_

Claude Code Version

2.1.258 (Claude Code)

Platform

Anthropic API

Operating System

Ubuntu/Debian Linux

Terminal/Shell

Other

Additional Information

The "Claude Model" question tells you how to find out which model you are using. The "Platform" question needs to do this as well — I have picked Anthropic API as that's _probably_ right, but the real answer is "I have absolutely no idea and don't know how to find out".