Terminal and background work

Open a project terminal

Choose Terminal in the workspace selector. Each tab contains your own shell, starting in the conversation’s project directory when it is available. Check the prompt or run pwd before executing a command.

Use it for a development server, focused test or ordinary project command. This terminal is a direct shell under your account; the agent’s conversation permission setting does not sandbox commands you type here.

Send selected output to chat

Select the relevant terminal text, then choose Send to chat. Helios puts it in the composer as a fenced code block. You can add a question, remove unrelated lines and review the message before sending.

Include the failing command and enough output to show the problem. Avoid sending an entire log when a short failure explains it, and remove credentials or unrelated personal data from the selected text.

Use project run configurations

The Terminal Run menu reads .claude/launch.json. Supported fields include name, runtimeExecutable, runtimeArgs, port, and optional cwd and env.

For a small static demo, create this file in the project:

{
  "configurations": [
    {
      "name": "Local preview",
      "runtimeExecutable": "python3",
      "runtimeArgs": ["-m", "http.server", "8765", "--bind", "127.0.0.1"],
      "port": 8765
    }
  ]
}

Select Local preview from Run. Helios starts it in a terminal tab and opens the Browser pane once its port answers. Use a free port and the correct working directory for your app.

When no launch configuration is available, Helios can use a project’s package.json dev or start script. Read a repository’s scripts before running them.

Follow background activity

The Background pane lists supported provider-reported activity that continues between turns, such as shells, monitors and agents. Claude and Muse provide background-work integrations; the exact rows and controls depend on the provider.

Rows can offer Stop and, once output exists, Output. Opening output shows it in the side pane. A session with reported active background work is kept alive while that work remains active.

This is not a list of every process on your computer. A command launched manually in Terminal, or a service outside the provider’s reported task system, may need to be managed in its own terminal or service manager.

If the terminal is unavailable

The native terminal requires VTE for GTK4, including gir1.2-vte-3.91 on the supported Ubuntu package path. Check the source dependencies if you run from a checkout.

For a process that exits immediately, read the terminal output and run the same project command in a normal terminal. That helps distinguish a project setup failure from the Helios pane.