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/compact: agent activity indicator fires immediately when next message is queued, making it look like the message was sent mid-compact #3915

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Description

@dfrysinger

Summary

When /compact is running and the user types and submits a new message, the message appears in BOTH the queued-message stack AND the main chat history, and the "working" activity indicator kicks on right away — as if the message had been sent to the LLM mid-compaction.

Actual behavior (verified)

Functionally this is correct: the agent does not actually receive or respond to the queued message until /compact finishes. The bug is purely visual / UX.

Expected

While /compact is still running, a newly typed message should:

  • Stay visible only in the queued stack
  • NOT appear duplicated in the main chat transcript
  • NOT trigger the "working" / activity indicator

The activity indicator and transcript echo should only fire once /compact completes and the message is actually dispatched to the model.

Why this matters

Users currently believe their message was sent prematurely and either re-send it, cancel, or assume /compact silently failed. The deceptive UI undermines trust in /compact.

Activity

  1. added
    area:context-memoryContext window, memory, compaction, checkpoints, and instruction loading
    area:terminal-renderingDisplay and rendering: flickering, scrolling, line wrapping, output formatting
    on Jun 24, 2026
  2. added theissue type on Jun 24, 2026
  3. copilot-cli-bot commented on Nov 14, 2026

    @copilot-cli-bot

    This appears to be resolved as of GitHub Copilot CLI v1.0.112. Please update to that release or a newer stable version. We're closing this as completed. If it still happens, please comment with your version and reproduction steps.

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    area:context-memoryContext window, memory, compaction, checkpoints, and instruction loadingarea:terminal-renderingDisplay and rendering: flickering, scrolling, line wrapping, output formatting

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