Startup Recovery

Release notes caching and terminal backup restoration on launch.

Release notes cache

Claude Code fetches the changelog from GitHub and caches it locally to display on next launch.

Flow

1. On startup: Check for cached changelog at ~/.claude/cache/changelog.md
2. If missing or old: Fetch from GitHub at startup (background, non-blocking)
3. Display: Show “What’s new” on next launch
4. Cache: Store to ~/.claude/cache/changelog.md for future launches

Configuration

Cached changelog location: ~/.claude/cache/changelog.md

• Auto-fetched: On startup if missing
• TTL: Not version-locked; refreshed periodically via background fetch
• Disabled: If network unreachable or GitHub endpoint unavailable, displays stale cache or skips

Content

Changelog typically includes:

• Latest Claude Code version features
• Bug fixes
• Breaking changes
• Upgrade notes

Displayed in terminal after session start if new content available.

Terminal backup recovery

Claude Code can auto-detect and restore terminal settings if a previous session’s terminal setup was interrupted.

Supported terminals

• macOS: iTerm2, Terminal.app
• Linux: tmux (via tmuxSocket.ts)

Backup location

~/.claude/backups/

Contents:

• Terminal state files (window size, colors, font settings)
• Session configuration

Recovery process

On startup, Claude Code:

1. Detects previous terminal setup in ~/.claude/backups/
2. Checks for incomplete shutdown (e.g., process killed, terminal crash)
3. Restores settings if recovery is safe:
   • Window size
   • Font/color scheme
   • Active pane/window layout

Disabling recovery

Recovery runs automatically. To disable:

• Delete backup files: rm -rf ~/.claude/backups/*
• Or set env var (if implemented): CLAUDE_CODE_SKIP_TERMINAL_RECOVERY=1

Backup retention

Backups are created on each session start and pruned periodically:

• Keep: Most recent 5–10 backups
• Delete: Backups >30 days old

Automatic cleanup runs at startup to avoid accumulating old backups.

---

← Back to Sessions/README.md