Alien Desk

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How to tell which Claude Code tab is waiting for you

Running several Claude Code sessions in terminal tabs? Here is how to notice when one stops to ask for permission, with a hook or with a small Mac panel.

When you run Claude Code in several terminal tabs, one of them often stops to ask for permission and waits there quietly. You only find out when you happen to click that tab, and by then it may have been waiting for twenty minutes.

Option 1: a notification hook

Claude Code runs hooks at certain moments. The Notification hook runs when Claude needs your permission or has been waiting for your input. Add this to ~/.claude/settings.json to get a macOS notification:

{
  "hooks": {
    "Notification": [
      {
        "hooks": [
          {
            "type": "command",
            "command": "osascript -e 'display notification \"Claude Code needs you\" with title \"Claude Code\"'"
          }
        ]
      }
    ]
  }
}

This tells you that some tab needs you. It does not tell you which one, notifications pile up when several tabs wait at once, and once a notification is gone nothing reminds you.

Option 2: see every tab at once

Alien Desk keeps a small panel on the side of your screen with one row per Claude Code tab. A tab asking for permission moves to the top, a dot appears on the menu bar icon, and finished tabs keep a green dot until you look. Click a row and the right Terminal, iTerm2 or Ghostty tab comes to the front.

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