Terminal Setup

HooCode uses the Kitty keyboard protocol for reliable modifier key detection. Most modern terminals support this protocol, but some require configuration.

Kitty, iTerm2

Work out of the box.

Alt keys

43 actions are reachable only with Alt — five of the six dials (Alt+A mode, Alt+M model, Alt+O output, Alt+L task ledger, Alt+C color), settings (Alt+S), the shortcut list (Alt+K), every picker verb, and the tree filters. A terminal that speaks the Kitty keyboard protocol reports Alt correctly and needs nothing here.

Interrupt (Esc), clear (Ctrl+C), exit (Ctrl+D), expand (Ctrl+O) and submit (Enter) are deliberately never on Alt, so a misconfigured terminal is recoverable. So is every dial that changes what the agent does: the thinking level also steps on Shift+Tab, and /mode, /model and /color reach the rest. Only the two that change what is drawn — the tool output dial and the task ledger’s lens — need Alt, and Ctrl+O still reaches full output and back.

macOS

Outside the Kitty protocol, macOS treats Option as a compose key rather than Alt. Option+M produces µ, Option+S produces ß, and Option+E, Option+U and Option+N are dead keys that emit nothing at all. HooCode never sees a key chord, so it types the character into the prompt instead — or, for the dead keys, appears to ignore the press entirely.

Ghostty, Kitty, WezTerm and iTerm2 negotiate the Kitty protocol and are unaffected. Terminal.app does not support it, so configure it explicitly:

Linux

GNOME Terminal and Konsole can claim Alt+<letter> for menu mnemonics before the application sees it — Alt+F for File, Alt+E for Edit, Alt+S for Search, Alt+T for Terminal, Alt+H for Help. Where those overlap, hoocode gets nothing.

In GNOME Terminal, turn off Preferences → General → Enable mnemonics. In Konsole, Settings → Configure Keyboard Shortcuts.

Rebinding instead

Any of these can be moved rather than configured around. See keybindings.md; for example, in ~/.hoocode/keybindings.json:

{
  "app.hotkeys.open": "ctrl+q",
  "app.settings.open": ["alt+s", "f2"]
}

Ghostty

Add to your Ghostty config (~/Library/Application Support/com.mitchellh.ghostty/config on macOS, ~/.config/ghostty/config on Linux):

keybind = alt+backspace=text:\x1b\x7f

Older Claude Code versions may have added this Ghostty mapping:

keybind = shift+enter=text:\n

That mapping sends a raw linefeed byte. Inside hoocode, that is indistinguishable from Ctrl+J, so tmux and hoocode no longer see a real shift+enter key event.

If Claude Code 2.x or newer is the only reason you added that mapping, you can remove it, unless you want to use Claude Code in tmux, where it still requires that Ghostty mapping.

If you want Shift+Enter to keep working in tmux via that remap, add ctrl+j to your hoocode newLine keybinding in ~/.hoocode/keybindings.json:

{
  "newLine": ["shift+enter", "ctrl+j"]
}

WezTerm

Create ~/.wezterm.lua:

local wezterm = require 'wezterm'
local config = wezterm.config_builder()
config.enable_kitty_keyboard = true
return config

VS Code (Integrated Terminal)

keybindings.json locations:

• macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/Code/User/keybindings.json
• Linux: ~/.config/Code/User/keybindings.json
• Windows: %APPDATA%\\Code\\User\\keybindings.json

Add to keybindings.json to enable Shift+Enter for multi-line input:

{
  "key": "shift+enter",
  "command": "workbench.action.terminal.sendSequence",
  "args": { "text": "\u001b[13;2u" },
  "when": "terminalFocus"
}

Windows Terminal

Add to settings.json (Ctrl+Shift+, or Settings → Open JSON file) to forward the modified Enter keys hoocode uses:

{
  "actions": [
    {
      "command": { "action": "sendInput", "input": "\u001b[13;2u" },
      "keys": "shift+enter"
    },
    {
      "command": { "action": "sendInput", "input": "\u001b[13;3u" },
      "keys": "alt+enter"
    }
  ]
}

• Shift+Enter inserts a new line.
• Windows Terminal binds Alt+Enter to fullscreen by default. That prevents hoocode from receiving Alt+Enter for follow-up queueing.
• Remapping Alt+Enter to sendInput forwards the real key chord to hoocode instead.

If you already have an actions array, add the objects to it. If the old fullscreen behavior persists, fully close and reopen Windows Terminal.

xfce4-terminal, terminator

These terminals have limited escape sequence support. Modified Enter keys like Ctrl+Enter and Shift+Enter cannot be distinguished from plain Enter, preventing custom keybindings such as submit: ["ctrl+enter"] from working.

For the best experience, use a terminal that supports the Kitty keyboard protocol:

• Kitty
• Ghostty
• WezTerm
• iTerm2
• Alacritty (requires compilation with Kitty protocol support)

IntelliJ IDEA (Integrated Terminal)

The built-in terminal has limited escape sequence support. Shift+Enter cannot be distinguished from Enter in IntelliJ’s terminal.

If you want the hardware cursor visible, set HOOCODE_HARDWARE_CURSOR=1 before running hoocode (disabled by default for compatibility).

Consider using a dedicated terminal emulator for the best experience.