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Documentation Index

Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://mintlify.com/javierpr0/Notchly/llms.txt

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Each Notchly tab is a fully independent terminal session with its own shell process, working directory, and Claude Code instance. You can run as many tabs as you need simultaneously — one per project, one per feature branch, or one for code changes alongside another running tests. Tabs persist across app restarts and reopen in the directory you last cd’d to.

Creating tabs

1

Keyboard shortcut

Press Cmd+T to open a new tab. It starts at $HOME if no other session is active, or at the most recently used directory.
2

Menu bar icon

Click the Notchly menu bar icon → New Session. The panel opens automatically and the new tab becomes active.
3

Drag a folder onto the panel

Drop any folder (or a file, which resolves to its enclosing folder) onto the Notchly panel. A highlighted drop zone appears while you drag. Notchly opens a new tab rooted at that directory. If the folder contains a CLAUDE.md, Claude launches automatically — the same behavior as opening a project manually.

Tab naming

Double-click any tab label to rename it inline. A text field appears in place; press Return to confirm or Escape to cancel. Tab names are sanitized of control characters before being stored, so names copied from untrusted sources cannot inject terminal escape sequences. You can also rename from the context menu: right-click a tab → Rename Tab.

Tab reordering

Drag a tab left or right along the strip to reorder it. The dragged tab lifts slightly (1.04× scale) and becomes semi-transparent while in flight; neighboring tabs shift to make room as you cross their midpoint. Release to drop. To reorder without dragging, use the keyboard shortcuts or the context menu:
  • Cmd+Shift+Left — move the active tab one position to the left
  • Cmd+Shift+Right — move the active tab one position to the right
  • Right-click a tab → Move Left / Move Right

Tab status indicators

Each tab shows a small status indicator to the left of its label:
IndicatorMeaning
Yellow spinnerClaude is actively working
Red waiting iconClaude is paused, waiting for your input on a permission prompt
Green checkmarkTask just completed (clears when you open the tab)
Accent dotNew output arrived while this tab was in the background
Moon icon (dimmed tab)Tab is sleeping

Searching terminal output

Press Cmd+F to open the in-pane search bar. Notchly uses SwiftTerm’s built-in search to scan the terminal buffer for a string and highlight matches. Use Return / Shift+Return to navigate forward and backward through results. Press Escape to dismiss the search bar.

Jumping between tabs

ShortcutAction
Cmd+TNew tab
Cmd+FSearch terminal output
Cmd+1–9Jump to the nth tab
Cmd+Shift+LeftMove tab left
Cmd+Shift+RightMove tab right

Closing tabs

Click the button that appears when you hover over a tab, or right-click → Close. If a tab is currently working or waiting for input, Notchly asks for confirmation before closing — idle tabs close immediately without a prompt. Worktree tabs have a dedicated close dialog that asks whether to discard the worktree and its branch or keep them on disk.

Sleeping tabs

Sleeping a tab kills its shell processes to free RAM and CPU, while preserving the full split pane layout and working directories for each pane. Right-click any tab to access sleep options.
Suspends the tab’s shell processes. The tab appears dimmed in the strip. Select it at any time to wake it — the shell respawns in the same working directory, and the split layout is restored exactly.
Sleeps every tab except the one you right-clicked. Notchly shows a confirmation dialog first with the count of tabs that would be affected, since this closes their terminal processes and loses any running work.
Wakes every sleeping tab at once. Terminals respawn lazily — each pane starts its shell the next time the tab is rendered.
Toggle that removes sleeping tabs from the visible tab strip. A compact 💤 N pill appears at the end of the strip showing how many are hidden. Click the pill to reveal them again, or right-click the pill → Wake All.

Muting notifications

Right-click any tab → Mute Notifications to silence “task done” and “needs input” alerts for that specific tab. The muted state persists across restarts. Toggle the same menu item to unmute.

Duplicating tabs

Right-click any tab → Duplicate Tab. Notchly clones the entire split pane layout with fresh pane IDs — each pane in the duplicate gets its own shell at the same working directory as the original. Live terminal state is not copied.

Working directory persistence

Notchly tracks your current directory as you cd around by reading OSC 7 terminal escape sequences emitted by the shell (enabled by setting TERM_PROGRAM=Apple_Terminal on spawn). The last known directory for each pane is saved to UserDefaults, and tabs reopen in that directory on the next launch.

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