Persistent Claude Code

A local GTK4 / GNOME desktop app for browsing and resuming Claude Code sessions without opening a terminal, navigating to the project, and running claude --resume <id>.

Features

• Sidebar browser of all sessions under ~/.claude/projects/, grouped by project, sorted by most-recent activity.
• Fuzzy filter across project paths and session titles (Ctrl+K). Press Enter in the search box to launch the first visible session.
• One-click resume: each session opens in its own tab running claude --resume <id> inside an embedded VTE terminal.
• + New session row per project for starting a fresh claude in that cwd.
• Embedded WebKit browser pane per tab (Ctrl+Shift+B), with back/forward/reload and a URL bar.
• --open-url URL flag routes xdg-open / $BROWSER requests from inside claude into the current tab's browser pane. (Playwright MCP still launches its own Chromium — that's a separate process we can't intercept.)
• Live status dots in the sidebar for sessions running in the app: 🟢 working, 🟡 waiting, ⚪ idle.
• "Session ended" placeholder with Resume and Close buttons when claude exits.
• Nord-themed VTE terminal with JetBrains Mono and 8 px padding (Ghostty-lookalike).
• Libadwaita theming follows system light/dark.
• Persistent state across restarts: open tabs reopen dormant (title preserved, claude not spawned until you click Resume), and expanded sidebar folders are remembered. Window size is also persisted.

Per-release details live under changelog/.

Install

Arch Linux only.

Recommended — AUR

yay -S persistent-claude-code-git

From a GitHub Release (pacman)

Download the .pkg.tar.zst asset from the latest release, then:

sudo pacman -U ./persistent-claude-code-git-*.pkg.tar.zst

From source

git clone https://github.com/seulsale/persistent-claude-code.git
cd persistent-claude-code
./install.sh
# to undo:
./uninstall.sh

Requirements

Arch packages (installed automatically by the PKGBUILD / checked by install.sh):

• python (3.14+)
• python-gobject
• gtk4
• libadwaita
• vte4
• webkitgtk-6.0
• ttf-jetbrains-mono

And the claude CLI installed and on $PATH.

Configuration

Config lives at ~/.config/persistent-claude-code/config.json (created on first launch with defaults). There is no in-app settings dialog in v1 — edit the file directly.

Key	Default	Purpose
terminal_font	"JetBrains Mono 11"	Pango font string for the VTE terminal.
terminal_scrollback	10000	Terminal scrollback line count.
claude_binary	null	Absolute path to claude; null resolves via $PATH.
browser_home	"about:blank"	Initial URL for a newly-opened browser pane.
window_size	[1400, 900]	Window size; auto-persisted on close.
open_tabs	[]	Tabs to restore on next launch; auto-persisted on close.
expanded_projects	[]	Sidebar folders expanded at close; auto-persisted.

Keybindings

Shortcut	Action
Ctrl+K	Focus sidebar search
Ctrl+T	Focus + New session of the first project
Ctrl+W	Close current tab
Ctrl+Tab / Ctrl+Shift+Tab	Cycle tabs forward / backward
Ctrl+Shift+B	Toggle the browser pane in the current tab
Ctrl+?	About dialog

All shortcuts use the capture phase so VTE doesn't swallow them while the terminal has focus.

Browser integration

When the app is running, persistent-claude-code --open-url <URL> forwards the URL to the primary instance's currently-selected tab and displays it in that tab's browser pane. The BROWSER environment variable is set to persistent-claude-code --open-url for every spawned claude process, so any xdg-open call inside Claude lands in the embedded pane. MCP servers that spawn their own browsers (e.g. Playwright) are unaffected.

If no session tab is currently selected when the URL arrives, a toast suggests opening one first.

Roadmap

• Full-text search across all messages of all sessions.
• In-app settings dialog.
• Per-session notes, tags, or favourites.
• System tray integration.
• Multi-distro packaging (Flatpak, .deb, .rpm).
• Multiple windows.

Changelog

Per-version details live under changelog/:

• v0.1.4 — terminal copy/paste shortcuts and right-click menu.
• v0.1.3 — sidebar redesign, tab persistence, AUR publish workflow.
• v0.1.2 — re-tag of v0.1.1 (no functional changes).
• v0.1.1 — fix claude lookup when launched from desktop entry.
• v0.1.0 — initial release.

License

MIT — see LICENSE.