[FEATURE] Windows desktop: computer-use side panel stays docked (no sidebar, windows hidden) until the whole turn ends

Summary

On Windows, as soon as a Code-tab session makes a display-scope computer-use call (screenshot, open_application), the desktop app docks its main window into the computer-use side panel. It then stays docked until the session's whole turn ends, even when the model used computer use once at the start of a long turn and spent the rest of it on shell, file and network work.

While docked, the session sidebar is gone, the main window is a narrow always-on-top panel, and other windows stay hidden (with "Unhide apps when Claude finishes" on). A user following the session remotely came back to a window with no sidebar and wondered whether the app was broken.

Observed

Claude desktop 2.7032.0.0 (Microsoft Store / MSIX), Claude Code 2.1.280, Windows 11 Home 10.0.26200, Opus 5.5. From %LOCALAPPDATA%\Claude\Logs\main.log, one session:

2026-09-25 01:26:22 [info] [cu-side-panel] docked      <- the turn's only computer-use call (open_application)
2026-09-25 01:59:18 [info] [cu-side-panel] restored    <- turn ended
2026-09-25 01:59:18 [info] mainView backgroundThrottling restored (visible popouts: 0, glow: hidden, cu lock: free, boot: done)

The panel stayed docked for about 33 minutes, while the session ran only PowerShell, Python and file edits. An earlier turn the same night docked at 01:00:16 after two screenshot / open_application calls and stayed docked for about 20 minutes, until the app was quit.

Expected / proposal

Any of these would help:

1. Release the cu lock, restore the window and unhide apps shortly after the last computer-use action, for example after a short idle timeout, and re-dock on the next call.
2. Give the model an explicit way to release the screen, such as a "done with the screen" action in the computer-use MCP.
3. Add an "Undock" / "Restore window" control on the side panel, so the user can get the full window back without quitting the app.
4. Document the docking behaviour in the desktop docs. The "Let Claude use your computer" section currently only mentions hiding other windows.

Related

• #95580: Windows window stuck always-on-top after the side panel restores. That bug did not occur here; the main window's WS_EX_TOPMOST bit was clear after restore.
• #66679: macOS phantom quit right after docking, closed as stale. It does not match here, since the quit came 20 minutes after docking.