Faster Startup and more UX Improvements

[srithreepo]

Here is Gemini CLI’s March 18th weekly update for v0.34.0

• 🎉 Performance & Reliability
  • JIT GEMINI.md Loading (Preview): The system now implements Just-In-Time (JIT) loading of GEMINI.md. Context is only pulled into memory once you first access a specific directory, significantly reducing initial overhead for large monorepos. (feat(core): instrument file system tools for JIT context discovery #22082, @SandyTao520)
  • Faster Startup: We have made significant improvements to the bootup path to reduce startup times. (perf(core): cache loadApiKey to reduce redundant keychain access #21520, @sehoon38).
• 👁️ UI/UX Enhancements
  • Overhauled Thinking UI: We have redesigned the "thinking" UX for better visual feedback during long-running tasks (feat(cli): overhaul thinking UI #18725, @keithguerin).
  • Smart Truncation: The approval dialog now no longer truncates the planmaking reviewing plans easier (fix(plan): prevent plan truncation in approval dialog by supporting unconstrained heights #21037, @Adib234).
  • MCP When referencing MCP Servers in your security policies, skills and context files you can now use the mcpName for better standardization Learn more. @abhipatel12 in #21425
  • Shell Formatting: Gemini CLI now shows Shell output with proper formatting. (@jacob314, #21237)
  • Support for Always Allow: By enabling the security.autoAddToPolicyByDefault setting you can have Gemini CLI select “Allow for all future sessions" as the default option for low risk tools @spencer426 in #20361
• 🎉Gemini CLI Extensions:
  • Easy uninstallation: Introducing --all flag to easily uninstall all extensions @sehoon38 in #21319
  • NVIDIA cuOpt:
    • Deploy Agent skills for NVIDIA cuOpt optimization engine: routing, LP/MILP/QP, installation, and server to solve large-scale problems with millions of variables and constraint
      • https://geminicli.com/extensions/?name=NVIDIAcuopt
  • Qodo:
    • Enable semantic code intelligence and search across multiple repositories with daily updated indexes.
      • https://geminicli.com/extensions/?name=qodo-aiopen-aware
• ✏️ CLI & Slash Commands
  • /footer command can now provide a unified, interactive way for you to configure and reorder items in the CLI footer (statusline) @jackwotherspoon in #19001
  • Easy Skill invocation: You can now directly invoke skills using /skill-name @NTaylorMullen in #21758
  • Unified Commands:
    • We've removed /chat in favor of /resume (feat(cli): unify /chat and /resume command UX #20256, @LyalinDotCom)
    • /compact now alias' /compress for manual compression. (feat(cli): add /compact alias for /compress command #21711, @jackwotherspoon)
  • Command Conflicts: When you have multiple commands with the same name they are now displayed with the user. and workspace. Prefix (feat(cli): implement dot-prefixing for slash command conflicts #20979, @ehedlund).
• Small features, Polish, Reliability & Bug Fixes: A large amount of changes, smaller features, UI updates, reliability and bug fixes + general polish made it in this week!