Recent Copilot Chat ID

Browse recently saved Copilot Chat sessions, copy their IDs, and optionally analyze backend-reported AI Credits on demand.

Install from Marketplace • Features • Commands • Privacy • 日本語

Important limitation

This extension shows a recently saved session ID. It does not claim to identify the current or active chat session. VS Code does not expose that identity through the stable Extension API.

Features

• Dedicated Recent Chat Sessions Activity Bar view
• Session rows show a local title or VS Code title, short ID, and relative save time
• Session rows carry the saved response state as an icon, a tooltip line, and a screen-reader label when VS Code recorded it
• Expand a row to inspect the full ID, saved time, and title source
• Inline and right-click actions to copy the title and ID together, inspect metadata, or set/clear a local title
• Copy a session row as two lines: its display title, then Session ID: <UUID>
• Open a script-free Session Inspector for bounded timing, response-state, and changed-line metadata when VS Code provides it
• Explicitly analyze backend-reported AI Credits, request count, and input/output token usage for one selected session, with per-model totals when available
• Copy the UUID alone from the expanded Session ID detail row or the global Copy Recent ID command
• Status bar: Recent: <title or short UUID>; selecting it reveals the session in the browser
• Tooltip shows how many session IDs are saved in the window
• Copy the full recent UUID
• Search saved sessions by title, full/short ID, or saved time
• Manually refresh the filename scan
• Refresh automatically when session files change
• Log diagnostics to the Recent Copilot Chat ID Output Channel
• Japanese UI when VS Code display language is ja

Installation

Install from the VS Code Marketplace, or run:

ext install yamapan.ag-show-session-id

For a local build:

1. Run npm install in this repository.
2. Run npm test to verify the extension locally.
3. Run npm run package to create the VSIX.
4. In VS Code, run Extensions: Install from VSIX... from the Command Palette.
5. Select the generated artifacts/vsix/ag-show-session-id-<version>.vsix and reload VS Code when prompted.

[!NOTE] Local development builds and the Marketplace release use the same extension ID, so installing a local VSIX in your normal profile replaces the installed Marketplace release. Use npm run verify:install for isolated verification, or reinstall the Marketplace version after manual testing.

Enable

Filename scanning is disabled by default. The extension offers to turn it on once per profile on first activation. You can also run any command and choose Enable in the prompt, or set agShowSessionId.enabled in User Settings.

Every feature is a separate machine-local opt-in, so nothing is read until you say so. To turn all of them on at once, run Enable All Local Features from the Command Palette, the view toolbar, or the welcome view. It shows one modal that states exactly what each setting reads, and enables filename scanning, session titles, AI Credits analysis, and Inspector analysis on open only after you confirm. The toolbar button disappears once every opt-in is on.

The extension then reads only .json and .jsonl filenames from the current window's local chatSessions storage directory. It reads file modification times for ordering. The opt-in setting is machine-scoped and is not synchronized to other devices.

Session titles are a separate opt-in. Enable agShowSessionId.readTitles from the view toolbar or Settings to read only the chat.ChatSessionStore.index entry from VS Code's local read-only state database. Titles can be derived from chat content, remain in memory only, and are never written to logs. Chat messages and JSONL contents are not read by this setting.

AI Credits analysis is another machine-local opt-in. The Inspector shows Not analyzed until you run Analyze AI Credits on a session row. The command reads only that selected session's .jsonl or legacy .json file. Session files contain chat content; the extension reconstructs request/session credits and input/output token fields, including per-model totals when the backend provides them. It retains only the bounded usage summary in memory and does not display, log, persist, cache, or send prompts and responses. Reopening the same saved version of an analyzed session reuses the in-memory result. Disabling agShowSessionId.readUsage clears the cache and immediately closes the open Session Inspector.

Opening the Inspector does not read a session file on its own. Set agShowSessionId.analyzeUsageOnInspectorOpen to true if you want the Inspector to start the analysis as it opens; it is off by default and takes effect only while agShowSessionId.readUsage is also on. With it enabled, the Inspector appears immediately as Analyzing and updates when the read finishes. Closing the Inspector, opening another session, or turning either setting off cancels the in-progress read.

The Inspector groups its rows into Session, Timing, Edits, and Usage sections. The Edits section shows the three counts when VS Code recorded them, and a single explanatory row when it did not.

Changed files, Lines added, and Lines removed come from VS Code's own chat index. VS Code records them only when a session is saved while a live editing session still reports a nonzero diff, and its synchronous shutdown flush rewrites entries without them. Most saved sessions therefore show Not recorded by VS Code for this saved session. The extension never estimates these numbers from chat content. See research/20260806-ai-credits-fixture-gate.md for the measured behavior.

The bounded session data is parsed in a local worker thread. Cancelling analysis or disabling usage reading terminates active parsing before it can update the cache or Inspector.

If analysis fails, the Inspector identifies common causes such as a missing, changed, unsupported, or oversized session file. The warning action can open the diagnostic Output Channel for the detailed error code.

Every user-facing string is localized, and a test proves each one has a Japanese translation. The Output Channel is deliberately left in English: it is a stable bug-report surface that logs safe error codes rather than UI copy.

Display title precedence is: local title > VS Code metadata title > Session <short ID>. Local titles persist by session ID in the local VS Code profile, follow the session between empty and workspace windows, are not synchronized, and never modify Copilot Chat storage. Early 0.1 development aliases are migrated automatically.

Commands

The table lists the Command Palette entries under the Recent Copilot Chat ID category. Session-specific copy, Inspector, AI Credits analysis, details, and local-title actions appear on session rows in the Activity Bar instead. The expanded Session ID detail has a separate UUID-only copy action.

When a command needs a session and none was picked in the Activity Bar, the Quick Pick lists each session with its short ID, unusual response state, relative age, a most-recent marker, and a detail line carrying the full ID and last-saved time. Typing matches the description and the detail, so a full UUID finds its session.

Settings

All four are machine-scoped, are not synchronized, and stay off until you turn them on. Enable All Local Features turns on all four after one modal disclosure.

Status bar states

Privacy

• No telemetry or network access
• No chat JSON/JSONL content reads by default; optional AI Credits analysis reads only the explicitly selected session file
• No debug log reads
• No session file writes
• Prompts, responses, references, paths, and tool payloads are never displayed, logged, persisted, cached, or sent by usage analysis
• Diagnostic logs include only shortened ID prefixes, never full session IDs
• Optional metadata reads one bounded index entry and retains only approved session ID, title, timing, response-state, and changed-line summary fields in memory
• Optional usage analysis retains only a bounded usage summary in memory; disabling it clears the summary and closes the Inspector
• The Session Inspector remains script-free and renders escaped text only, and its webview is granted no local resource roots
• Session titles come from chat content, so they are escaped before Markdown tooltips and stripped of icon syntax before the status bar, Quick Pick, and notifications

Compatibility

• Minimum declared VS Code version: 1.125.0
• Verified development environment: VS Code 1.131.0 on Windows 11
• Desktop local windows only
• Empty windows (no folder open) read the separate global chat session storage
• Virtual workspaces, VS Code for the Web, and some Remote/WSL layouts can report unavailable
• This extension depends on an undocumented internal storage location and degrades without modifying data when that layout is unavailable
• Session titles need the node:sqlite builtin, which every VS Code release in the supported range ships. It is still loaded lazily behind a guard, so an unexpected runtime without it logs SessionIndexUnsupportedRuntime, stops watching the index, and keeps filename scanning working instead of failing activation
• VS Code does not expose a stable API to add actions to built-in Copilot Chat session rows, so this extension uses its own Activity Bar view

The source workspace includes the API and storage analysis at research/20260805-copilot-chat-session-id-extension.md.

Development

npm install
npm test
npm run package
npm run verify:install
npm run verify:release

The VSIX is written to artifacts/vsix/. verify:install installs that VSIX into an isolated .vscode-test profile and confirms the packaged extension ID and version without changing your normal VS Code installation. verify:release runs the complete local gate: dependency audit, unit and Extension Host tests, package verification, and isolated installation.