Pingo for VS Code
Give your coding agents a voice. Pingo hears, sees, and tracks when Claude Code, OpenCode, Codex, Gemini, or Aider need your attention — right inside VS Code.
Install the extension and keep using your agents exactly as you do today. No wrapper command, no separate service, no workflow change.
opencode claude codex gemini aider
Pingo automatically detects approval requests, task completions, errors, authentication issues, and rate limits — then plays a sound, speaks an alert, and shows a non-modal indicator in the activity bar. It never interrupts you with toast popups while you're working.
Setup
- Install this extension.
- Use your agents normally. The status bar shows
$(bell) Pingo Active when Pingo is watching your terminals.
- (Claude Code extension users only) Run
Pingo: Enable Claude Code Integration from the Command Palette once, then restart your Claude Code session.
How it works
Pingo watches for "your agent needs you" signals from three independent sources, all feeding the same handler (events are de-duplicated):
| Source |
Method |
| Terminal agents (claude, opencode, codex, gemini, aider) |
Shell Integration API — passive monitoring, no setup |
| Claude Code extension panel |
Localhost hook bridge — run the setup command once |
pingo <agent> CLI (optional) |
WebSocket client — for shells without shell integration |
For the common case, no CLI, no localhost server, and no WebSocket are needed.
Away-aware alerts
Pingo plays a sound only when you've stepped away. While you're attending an agent (terminal active + window focused), the alert is held silently and shown in the status bar with a live countdown. It sounds once you've been away for pingo.awaySeconds (default 30). Set to 0 to alert instantly.
All event types alert: approval, authentication, errors, rate limits, completions, and waiting-for-input. For approval and authentication, the sound repeats every 5 seconds until you attend. A held alert is dropped if the agent's turn ends, the terminal closes, or it's held longer than 5 minutes.
Features
- Passive detection — no
pingo prefix, no setup
- Claude Code extension support — via Notification/Stop hooks (agent-agnostic bridge)
- Sound + voice notifications — for approvals, completions, errors, auth, and rate limits
- Away-aware alerts — silent while you work, audible when you've stepped away
- Non-modal indicator — events in the activity-bar panel, never interrupting toast popups
- Status bar — live countdown while an agent waits, flashes Approval Needed when it sounds
- One-click mute —
Pingo: Toggle Mute silences sound/voice instantly
- Event history —
Pingo: Show Events (select for details, copy message, or clear)
Commands
| Command |
Description |
Pingo: Enable Claude Code Integration |
Wire up Claude Code hooks |
Pingo: Toggle Mute |
Silence sound/voice |
Pingo: Re-scan Terminals |
Re-detect agents after reload |
Pingo: Test Notification / Pingo: Test Sound / Pingo: Test Voice |
Preview alerts |
Pingo: Show Events / Pingo: Clear Notifications |
View or clear event history |
Pingo: Open Settings |
Configure Pingo |
Settings
| Setting |
Default |
Description |
pingo.notify |
both |
both / sound / voice / disabled |
pingo.monitorTerminals |
true |
Passively monitor integrated terminals |
pingo.awaySeconds |
30 |
Seconds away before alert sounds (0 = instant) |
pingo.ignorePatterns |
[] |
Substrings to ignore in detection |
pingo.claudeHooks |
true |
Host Claude Code hook listener |
pingo.hookPort |
4100 |
Port for hook listener |
pingo.showVscodeNotifications |
true |
Show events in activity-bar panel |
pingo.debug |
false |
Write diagnostic logs |
pingo.useCliFallback |
false |
Listen to pingo <agent> CLI |
pingo.port |
4001 |
Port for CLI event server |
Troubleshooting
- No sound on a fresh install — Pingo warns once if sound files are missing; reinstalling usually fixes it.
- Claude Code integration silent — run
Pingo: Enable Claude Code Integration again. If port 4100 is busy, Pingo falls forward to the next free port.
- Agent not detected after reload — the Shell Integration API can't read past terminal output. Run
Pingo: Re-scan Terminals to re-detect; scanning resumes once the agent prints new output.
Optional: CLI fallback
For shells without shell integration, install the standalone CLI:
npm install -g pingo
pingo claude # or opencode, codex, gemini, aider
Enable pingo.useCliFallback to surface its events in the extension. Events from both sources are de-duplicated.
