Using the panel

The Wheelhouse panel runs Claude Code inside Visual Studio. Open it from View › Wheelhouse, dock it wherever suits, and press Start Claude.

Sessions

A session works in the folder of the solution you have open, with the same settings, CLAUDE.md files and MCP servers as Claude Code in a terminal there. End session stops it. The Session menu offers:

  • Start or Restart: a new conversation that remembers nothing.
  • Restart and continue: carry on with the most recent conversation for this folder, including one started in a terminal.
  • An earlier conversation, to reopen it with what was said shown again. Conversations from the Git branch you are on come first, under the branch's name; the rest follow under Other branches, newest first, each labelled with its branch.

If Claude Code is not signed in, the panel offers to sign you in, in your browser, and starts the session as soon as you have. If sign-in lapses during a session, it asks again and then carries on with the same conversation.

Asking

  • Enter sends; Shift+Enter starts a new line. While Claude is working, the Send button becomes Stop.
  • Type / at the start for Claude Code's commands, and @ anywhere for its subagents; pick from the list with the arrow keys and Enter. /mcp lists the session's MCP servers.
  • Attach files adds files to the next prompt. Ctrl+V in the prompt box attaches whatever is on the clipboard that is not text: a screenshot, or files copied in Explorer. Images go to Claude as images; other files are named by path for Claude to open.
  • After a turn, Claude Code may suggest a next prompt above the box. Click it to put it in the box, or dismiss it.
  • The pickers along the top choose the model, the permission mode and the output style for the next turn, and Fast turns fast mode on or off where your plan offers it.

Permissions and questions

When Claude wants to use a tool that your permission mode does not already allow, the panel asks: Allow this once, Always allow that tool, or Deny. When Claude asks you to choose between options, they appear as buttons with Claude's description of each, and your answers go back together.

With Review edits before they happen turned on in settings, each file change Claude asks to make opens in Visual Studio's diff viewer first, and Allow or Deny decides it, even for a tool you chose to always allow. Review needs a permission mode that asks: in modes that approve edits without asking, there is no moment to show the diff, and the panel says so.

The conversation

  • Your prompts sit on the right; Claude's answers are formatted text on the left, with working links. Everything can be selected and copied, and the right-click menu copies a message or the whole conversation.
  • While a turn runs, each tool call is listed as it happens. When the turn ends, they fold into one line naming the tools used, which you can open again. A run with a failure stays open.
  • If you scroll back, the view stops following new messages; the ↓ Latest button takes you back to the newest one.
  • When Claude Code compacts a long conversation, its summary appears as one line, Context compaction complete, which opens to show what was carried forward.
  • The strip along the top shows who you are signed in as, and how full the model's context window is; it turns amber and then red as it fills, before Claude Code compacts.
  • Ctrl+plus and Ctrl+minus (or Ctrl+mouse wheel) change the text size.

In the editor

Claude's edits go through Visual Studio's editor, so you watch them happen and one Ctrl+Z undoes a whole change. The lines Claude changed are marked in the margin. Files Claude writes can be brought to the front as it works, for every file, only files in the solution, or never. Visual Studio's status bar shows what Claude is doing even when the panel is hidden.

Settings

The gear button opens the settings, which take the conversation's place until you press Done.

  • Editor: which files to bring to the front, and whether to mark changed lines.
  • Session: stream replies as they are written, show progress in the status bar, review edits in a diff first, and let the Claude app reach the session through Remote Control.
  • Licence: trial days left or who the licence is for; enter or remove a key.
  • MCP servers: the session's servers and their state. Enable or disable one for this session, and approve a project's .mcp.json servers.
  • Appearance: text size.
  • Versions: the Wheelhouse extension, its MCP server and Visual Studio. Report an issue opens the report form with them filled in, and Copy versions puts them on the clipboard.