Add settings for "notifying" on "activity" by carlos-zamora · Pull Request #20014 · microsoft/terminal

carlos-zamora · 2026-03-25T02:32:41Z

This PR implements the proposal in this comment. It adds 3 settings:

notifyOnActivity: send a "notification"(below) of some kind when an inactive tab has new output.
notifyOnNextPrompt: Similarly, but when we get a new prompt start (requires shell integration)
autoDetectRunningCommand: attempt to automatically detect the progress state of this profile

For the notifyOn* settings, they take any combination of the following flags:

tab: flash the taskbar
audible: emit an audible bell (This will use the sounds from bellSounds, if specified)
taskbar: display an icon in the tab (ala terminal activity indicator/alert when in background #7955 (comment) ) (basically, similar to the bell icon)
notification: send a desktop "toast" (read: notification). Clicking that notification will focus the tab that sent it

For the autoDetectRunningCommand setting, we support:

false: don't do this
true: (requires shell integration) if we got a FTCS_COMMAND_EXECUTED (133;C), then any output, set our progress state to indeterminate

Validated using this config:

"defaults":
{
	"autoDetectRunningCommand": true,
	"autoMarkPrompts": true, // Needed even when your OMP config has shell integration enabled
	"rightClickContextMenu": true,
	"showMarksOnScrollbar": true
},
"list":
[
	{
		"commandline": "pwsh -nologo",
		"name": "Activity",
		"notifyOnActivity":
		[
			"taskbar",
			"audible",
			"tab",
			"notification"
		]
	},
	{
		"commandline": "pwsh -nologo",
		"name": "Next Prompt",
		"notifyOnNextPrompt":
		[
			"taskbar",
			"audible",
			"tab",
			"notification"
		]
	},

Closes terminal activity indicator/alert when in background #7955 (via notifyOnActivity)
Closes Notification after a long running command finishes #6372 (via the notifyOnNextPrompt)
Closes Add a "tab busy indicator" to show when a tab has belled or has output #1620 (via autoDetectRunningCommand)
Related to Send Desktop Notification via VT Sequence (OSC777) #7718

Heavily based on #19935
Co-authored by @zadjii-msft

@zadjii-msft

## Summary of the Pull Request Targets #20010 Manually assign an AUMID to our process when we're running unpackaged. Main difference from #19937 is what AUMID we use. Before, it was per branding, but the `WindowEmperor` already appends an exe path hash for unpackaged instances to prevent crosstalk. Here, we're just using the same pattern: `Microsoft.WindowsTerminal.<hash>`. Heavily based on #19937 Co-authored by @zadjii-msft

carlos-zamora · 2026-03-27T02:29:20Z

Tested this out, it's pretty cool.
Reviewed it myself and using GHCP, everything looks good.

The only thing I can think of is the possibility of adding the experimental. prefix to these settings, but even then, I don't think that necessarily does anything. Like, when would it exit experimental?

So yeah, marked this as ready for review. Enjoy y'all! 😊

heaths · 2026-04-17T17:16:03Z

          "description": "Sets the sound played when the application emits a BEL. When set to an array, the terminal will pick one of those sounds at random.",
          "$ref": "#/$defs/BellSound"
        },
+        "notifyOnInactiveOutput": {


What about a setting for duration? Ghostty has this as well. I may only want to see this after, say, 10s and not a command that maybe takes a second and I quickly flip away intending to come back in a few seconds. A longer job is more likely something we'll "walk away from" for a longer period instead of just flipping windows back and forth a bit.

If someone really wanted to be alerted for every command when the window is inactive, they can set this to 0 (or maybe that's the default).

Hmm... ghostty calls these settings activity-monitor and activity-monitor-threshold. So, we could name this notifyOnInactiveOutputThreshold and also have it take an int representing seconds (default of 0). Then just place them next to each other in the settings UI.

Having a higher default (IIRC, Ghostty's is 30s when enabled) might solve the other issue you mentioned, but you could also debounce notifications. If they come in within Xs (maybe also configurable), don't notify. Frankly, given the goal is to notify you some task is done - and this would seem to be a long-running task, IMO, since any quick task you're probably coming back to frequently - the "threshold" having a higher default like 30s would probably be sufficient - at least as a start.

"notifyOnInactiveOutput" sounds a bit weird to me and I think I'd prefer something like "notifyOnActivity". It not sending a notification when focused seems implicitly natural to me, so it probably doesn't need to be in the name.

carlos-zamora · 2026-04-17T21:14:09Z

I was just using this feature with Copilot, and it was sending a ton of notifications as it was thinking.
At first, I was thinking that we should only let the session send one notification of this type, but now I'm not sure if that's the right approach. I'm particularly thinking of situations where the attached CLI app may send a bit of output, then wait, then send more. I guess in a situation like that, we definitely want a notification on the second one, and maybe on the first?

Thoughts? CC @DHowett @zadjii-msft

zadjii-msft · 2026-04-17T21:24:31Z

IMO:

I think we need to send one notification when the tab gets activity and then no more until that pane is focused.
If it emits some text, and you don't focus it, and then five minutes later it emits some more text, we don't send a second notification. That pane is already in the "there was inactive activity" state. We don't need to send another notification until the user activates it (to dismiss that state)

Like, consider how the in-tab indicator would work. It's like the bell icon. "this tab did a thing" stays until the user activates it to dismiss that state.

lhecker · 2026-04-22T11:52:49Z

+              }
+            },
+            {
+              "type": "string",


If the setting always used an array, I think that'd be fine too. That's just [two] extra characters after all.

Keeping as is. You'd be surprised how many people forgot the [] back with keyChords haha.

lhecker · 2026-04-22T12:21:04Z

-                page->Dispatcher().RunAsync(winrt::Windows::UI::Core::CoreDispatcherPriority::Normal, [weakPage{ page->get_weak() }, weakTab, weakContent]() {
-                    if (const auto p{ weakPage.get() })
+                page->Dispatcher().RunAsync(winrt::Windows::UI::Core::CoreDispatcherPriority::Normal, [weakThis, weakTab, weakContent]() {
+                    if (const auto p{ weakThis.get() })


personally i'd revert it, since it's unrelated - what makes it neat?

It's a lot easier to read.

The base branch was changed.

lhecker

Love it! The only minor qualm I have is the naming of "notifyOnInactiveOutput".

DHowett

5/51 blocking for discussion...

DHowett

34/51

DHowett · 2026-05-04T20:33:33Z

-                page->Dispatcher().RunAsync(winrt::Windows::UI::Core::CoreDispatcherPriority::Normal, [weakPage{ page->get_weak() }, weakTab, weakContent]() {
-                    if (const auto p{ weakPage.get() })
+                page->Dispatcher().RunAsync(winrt::Windows::UI::Core::CoreDispatcherPriority::Normal, [weakThis, weakTab, weakContent]() {
+                    if (const auto p{ weakThis.get() })


personally i'd revert it, since it's unrelated - what makes it neat?

DHowett · 2026-05-04T20:44:59Z

+        pair_type{ "none", AllClear },
+        pair_type{ "taskbar", ValueType::Taskbar },
+        pair_type{ "audible", ValueType::Audible },
+        pair_type{ "tab", ValueType::Tab },
+        pair_type{ "notification", ValueType::Notification },
+        pair_type{ "all", AllSet },


does this differ from the other notification styles we have? if so, why? if not, why have a separate type for it?

Good eye. The overlap is a bit weird here:

< investigation notes>

OutputNotificationStyle BellStyle

taskbar ✅ ✅

audible ✅ ✅

tab ✅ ❌

notification ✅ ✅

window ❌ ✅

visual = window + taskbar ❌ ✅

Note: OutputNotificationStyle is used by notifyOnActivity and notifyOnNextPrompt.

The question kinda becomes:

should notifyOnActivity/notifyOnNextPrompt support window?

I can see this being useful. It would be a more aggressive flash whenever the terminal session/control is visible. If it's a background tab, it shouldn't flash.

my opinion: ✅

should bellStyle support tab?

BEL seems critical enough to deserve a tab indicator. I don't think that should be configurable. My concern is specifically that someone accidentally omits tab and effectively silences BEL's visual indicator.

my opinion: ❌

Then, should tab be removed from notifyOnActivity/notifyOnNextPrompt?

No? A tab indicator seems valuable. It's an easy way to visually identify which tabs are requesting attention. It's a sensible way to opt-in for this setting/behavior, especially since it's disabled by default.

my opinion: ❌

Implementation-wise, we could consolidate these to be a single NotificationStyle enum in the backend. Then just omit the ones that aren't used in TerminalSettingsSerializationHelpers.h. The fix in the TerminalSettingsEditor side would be a bit more troublesome due to the EnumMappings, but doable.

</ investigation notes>

Though I like the idea of adding window for consistency, I don't think it's worth merging the enums.

Let me know what you think

CC @zadjii-msft (you may have opinions on https://github.com/microsoft/terminal/pull/20014/changes/BASE..b044fd661d730a70fdb11c0c0c5ee4b1e2ba20b6#r3185470645 too)

DHowett · 2026-05-04T20:45:30Z

+
+    auto FromJson(const Json::Value& json)
+    {
+        if (json.isBool())


this is a NEW SETTING, I do not believe it needs a fallback boolean mapper... right?

Need? No.

That said, something like "notifyOnActivity": true and "notifyOnNextPrompt": true feels like a good QOL improvement. Much easier to read/write.

That said, true is pretty ambiguous here. IMO. There's a lot of flags, so on first glance, it's a bit overwhelming. I'd probably default to "all" and call it a day. Really this is indicative of a larger issue on how to simplify these settings, but I'll leave that for another day.

tldr: removing boolean support for now. I think there's value to having a simple boolean toggle, but I think that's a part of a broader discussion of how to simplify these settings more.

…CommandActivity

carlos-zamora · 2026-05-08T00:36:07Z

Weird interaction to note. When notifyOnActivity is enabled on a Copilot session, I get notified nonstop. I suspect that it's because Copilot is constantly writing to the buffer, so technically this feature is functioning "by design", but it's definitely not a good experience.

A "toggle notifying on activity" action could be useful here. Currently, I have to go into the settings and enable/disable notifications at a profile-level. But I'm finding that I don't like that level of customization that much. I generally only use one PowerShell profile, so I'm finding that I prefer session-level customization over profile-level ones.

carlos-zamora · 2026-05-08T01:15:59Z

Similarly, for notifyOnNextPrompt running a simple one-off command like OpenConsole.slnx or code . will open the app, then immediately send out a desktop notification. Again, this is "by design", but I wonder if a better experience would be to opt-in for notifications when I know I'm going to be waiting for a while.

For both of these, Heath's suggestion of a minimum threshold are relevant. Should be easy to add too, so that's probably the next step of work to do in this PR.

carlos-zamora added 3 commits March 25, 2026 10:29

Add toast notification infrastructure

c49bc1a

spell

c23e507

spell; prefer AppDisplayName; use C++20 designated init

aeb531f

carlos-zamora force-pushed the dev/cazamor/toast/base branch from 4357c17 to aeb531f Compare March 25, 2026 17:29

carlos-zamora force-pushed the dev/cazamor/toast/activity branch from 47c0ae7 to 09c47c6 Compare March 25, 2026 21:51

fix extra window and reorder/glom scenarios

5f3db13

carlos-zamora force-pushed the dev/cazamor/toast/activity branch from 09c47c6 to 98a4ccb Compare March 27, 2026 02:27

carlos-zamora marked this pull request as ready for review March 27, 2026 02:27

carlos-zamora added the zBugBash-Consider label Apr 3, 2026

carlos-zamora commented Apr 6, 2026

View reviewed changes

Comment thread src/cascadia/TerminalSettingsEditor/Resources/en-US/Resources.resw Outdated

carlos-zamora added a commit that referenced this pull request Apr 6, 2026

PRE-MERGE #20014 Add settings for "notifying" on "activity"

a6af0d5

carlos-zamora commented Apr 7, 2026

View reviewed changes

Comment thread src/cascadia/TerminalSettingsEditor/Profiles_Advanced.xaml Outdated

carlos-zamora added a commit that referenced this pull request Apr 8, 2026

PRE-MERGE #20014 Add settings for "notifying" on "activity"

ba90c58

Suppress notification if focused; add pane data

b53ccb8

carlos-zamora force-pushed the dev/cazamor/toast/activity branch from 90fdd9b to fbb886e Compare April 17, 2026 02:05

heaths reviewed Apr 17, 2026

View reviewed changes

lhecker previously approved these changes Apr 22, 2026

View reviewed changes

carlos-zamora added 6 commits April 29, 2026 14:40

--from-toast & GetTickCount64()

54009e1

Merge branch 'main' into dev/cazamor/toast/base

6c88741

Add settings for "notifying" on "activity"

15ce2fd

minor cleanup

62727bf

Fix settings UI

da00f88

Address Leonard's feedback

6c2b796

carlos-zamora force-pushed the dev/cazamor/toast/activity branch from fbb886e to 6c2b796 Compare April 30, 2026 00:23

Base automatically changed from dev/cazamor/toast/base to main April 30, 2026 00:24

microsoft-github-policy-service Bot added the Product-Terminal The new Windows Terminal. label Apr 30, 2026

fix build

a07dba5

lhecker approved these changes May 4, 2026

View reviewed changes

carlos-zamora added 2 commits May 4, 2026 11:27

Merge branch 'main' into dev/cazamor/toast/activity

4e62092

notifyOnInactiveOutput --> notifyOnActivity

2348380

This comment was marked as resolved.

Sign in to view

psychically debug failed formatter

b044fd6

lhecker approved these changes May 4, 2026

View reviewed changes

DHowett requested changes May 4, 2026

View reviewed changes

Comment thread doc/cascadia/profiles.schema.json Outdated

Comment thread src/cascadia/TerminalApp/IPaneContent.idl Outdated

Comment thread src/cascadia/TerminalApp/Tab.cpp Outdated

microsoft-github-policy-service Bot added the Needs-Author-Feedback The original author of the issue/PR needs to come back and respond to something label May 4, 2026

DHowett requested changes May 4, 2026

View reviewed changes

DHowett reviewed May 4, 2026

View reviewed changes

Comment thread src/cascadia/TerminalApp/TerminalPaneContent.cpp Outdated

carlos-zamora mentioned this pull request May 4, 2026

Add support for OSC777 (Send Notification) #20012

Open

3 tasks

carlos-zamora added 2 commits May 4, 2026 17:55

autoDetectRunningCommand --> bool; _autoDetectEnabled --> _autoDetect…

042eb5b

…CommandActivity

remove .leading from throttledTaskbarProgressChanged

07a4f3a

microsoft-github-policy-service Bot removed the Needs-Author-Feedback The original author of the issue/PR needs to come back and respond to something label May 5, 2026

{0} --> ::None; remove _restoring

0719634

This comment was marked as resolved.

Sign in to view

carlos-zamora added 3 commits May 5, 2026 17:15

add indicator to cmd plt

8f4aa8e

TerminalPaneContent: OutputIdle --> OutputBurstEnded

dc27359

NotificationEventArgs: OnlyWhenInactive --> AlwaysNotify (flip logic)

3002075

zadjii-msft mentioned this pull request May 11, 2026

Feature request: Enable customization for tabs on bottom/right/left #835

Open

carlos-zamora added 3 commits May 12, 2026 18:02

add "notifyOnActivityThreshold" & "notifyOnNextPromptThreshold"

5f38be7

reuse existing resources for auto props

5671899

code format

89b2295

github-advanced-security AI found potential problems May 13, 2026

View reviewed changes

Comment thread src/cascadia/TerminalSettingsEditor/Resources/en-US/Resources.resw Fixed

This comment has been minimized.

Sign in to view

remove '-' & use 'threshold' term

e42b302

	`OutputNotificationStyle`	`BellStyle`
`taskbar`	✅	✅
`audible`	✅	✅
`tab`	✅	❌
`notification`	✅	✅
`window`	❌	✅
`visual` = `window` + `taskbar`	❌	✅

Conversation

carlos-zamora commented Mar 25, 2026 • edited Loading Uh oh! There was an error while loading. Please reload this page.

Uh oh!

Uh oh!

carlos-zamora commented Mar 27, 2026

Uh oh!

Uh oh!

Uh oh!

Choose a reason for hiding this comment

Uh oh!

Choose a reason for hiding this comment

Uh oh!

Choose a reason for hiding this comment

Uh oh!

Choose a reason for hiding this comment

Uh oh!

carlos-zamora commented Apr 17, 2026

Uh oh!

zadjii-msft commented Apr 17, 2026

Uh oh!

Uh oh!

Choose a reason for hiding this comment

Uh oh!

Choose a reason for hiding this comment

Uh oh!

Choose a reason for hiding this comment

Uh oh!

Choose a reason for hiding this comment

Uh oh!

Choose a reason for hiding this comment

Uh oh!

Uh oh!

Uh oh!

Uh oh!

Uh oh!

lhecker left a comment

Choose a reason for hiding this comment

Uh oh!

This comment was marked as resolved.

DHowett left a comment

Choose a reason for hiding this comment

Uh oh!

Uh oh!

Uh oh!

Uh oh!

DHowett left a comment

Choose a reason for hiding this comment

Uh oh!

Uh oh!

Choose a reason for hiding this comment

Uh oh!

Uh oh!

Uh oh!

Uh oh!

Uh oh!

Choose a reason for hiding this comment

Uh oh!

Choose a reason for hiding this comment

Uh oh!

Choose a reason for hiding this comment

Uh oh!

Choose a reason for hiding this comment

Uh oh!

Uh oh!

This comment was marked as resolved.

carlos-zamora commented May 8, 2026

Uh oh!

carlos-zamora commented May 8, 2026

Uh oh!

Uh oh!

This comment has been minimized.

Reviewers

Assignees

Labels

Projects

Milestone

Development

Uh oh!

6 participants

carlos-zamora commented Mar 25, 2026 •

edited

Loading