Sidebar auto-opens when opening new window

[bantic]

App Version

3.19.6

API Provider

AWS Bedrock

Model Used

n/a

🔁 Steps to Reproduce

I'm not sure if this is a bug, but it seems to be new behavior that I presume happened when the Roo VS Code extension updated.
Every time I open a new window (VSCode "File" -> "New window...") the right side panel opens, focused on Roo Code.
I don't think it used to be this way, and it interferes w/ my workflow because I usually want to run a separate VS Code command right after opening a window, but when the sidebar opens it takes the focus away from what I was about to execute.

💥 Outcome Summary

Expected opening a new VS Code window to show a new "Untitled" file with no sidebars open, but instead got a new "Untitled" file and the right sidebar opens after about 500-1000ms focused on Roo Code.

📄 Relevant Logs or Errors (Optional)

[dosubot]

Hi @bantic! I'm Dosu and I’m helping the Roo-Code team.

I couldn't find any documentation or settings for Roo Code that explain or control the sidebar auto-opening behavior in version 3.19.6. The release notes mention some sidebar compatibility improvements in earlier versions, but nothing about this specific change or a way to disable it. There are also no tickets or discussions about this issue in the available docs. If you need a workaround, you might try manually closing the sidebar after opening a new window, but as of now, there’s no documented way to prevent it from auto-opening automatically.
Release notes reference

To reply, just mention @dosu.

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[daniel-lxs]

After investigating the codebase, I can confirm that Roo Code does not control the sidebar's visibility or automatic opening behavior when new VSCode windows are created.

The extension only programmatically focuses the sidebar in specific scenarios (like when a task is cancelled or through explicit user commands), but it has no code that automatically opens the sidebar during window creation or startup.

This behavior is most likely controlled by VSCode's built-in settings for sidebar and panel restoration. You may want to check your VSCode workspace and user settings related to sidebar behavior to resolve this issue.

I'll be closing the issue to cleanup our backlog but feel free to continue the discussion.

[bantic]

@daniel-lxs Thanks for taking a look.

I have been debugging locally w/ extensions disabled and I think I've found the Roo Code change that results in this behavior.
I used git bisect to pin it down -- at each commit my test was to run the "Debug: Start Debugging and Stop on Entry" command.
One caveat is that I realized that if the new window had the sidebar open when the window was closed, then upon reopening of the window the sidebar would also be open. So for each test I had to ensure that I closed the sidebar before closing the window.

Anyway I pinpointed it to the change at #4267

After that change, the ClineProvider.getInstance() call is made (here) when the extension activates, which calls executeCommand(`${Package.name}.SidebarProvider.focus`) (here), which opens the sidebar.

Before PR #4267, ClineProvider.getInstance() does not get called at activation, so the sidebar doesn't auto-open.

The stack trace is roughly:

• ... earlier activation stuff...
• McpHub calls updateServerConnections
• ... which calls notifyWebviewOfServerChanges here
• ... which calls ClineProvider.getInstance() here
• ... which executes the command to focus the sidebar, which opens it

I'm not familiar enough with the code to have a clear idea how to fix this, but if I have a chance I'll look into it and would open a PR.

[daniel-lxs]

@bantic Thank you for looking into this, I wonder if this change is necessary for something, I'll look into it!