What's Wrong?
When the Read tool fails, the TUI shows only a pink dot with the tool call — no error message is displayed. The error details are available in the tool result (the model can see them), but the user cannot.
Successful read:
● Read(/tmp/test-read.txt)
⎿ Read 4 lines
Failed read (file does not exist):
● Read(/tmp/this-file-does-not-exist.txt)
No ⎿ Error: ... line appears. The dot turns pink, but the reason for the failure is invisible.
What Should Happen?
The TUI should display the error message below the tool call, the same way Bash and WebFetch errors are displayed. For example:
● Read(/tmp/this-file-does-not-exist.txt)
⎿ Error: File does not exist
Steps to Reproduce
- Run Claude Code
- Ask Claude to read a non-existent file:
Read /tmp/nonexistent.txt
- Observe the TUI — the dot turns pink but no error message is shown
Also reproducible with:
- Reading a PDF without
poppler-utils installed — the model receives "pdftoppm is not installed. Install poppler-utils..." but the user sees nothing
Model: Opus
Is this a regression?: I don't know
Claude Code Version: 2.1.33
Platform: Anthropic API
Operating System: Ubuntu/Debian Linux
Terminal/Shell: iTerm2
Additional Information
The error message is present in the tool result — the model can see it and react to it (e.g., installing poppler-utils in response to the PDF error). The problem is purely on the TUI rendering side: the error content is not displayed to the user.
This is particularly impactful for the PDF case: the Read tool's description says "This tool can read PDF files (.pdf)", but when it fails due to missing poppler-utils, the user sees a silent pink dot with no guidance on how to fix it.
✍️ Author: Claude Code with @carrotRakko (AI-written, human-approved)
What's Wrong?
When the Read tool fails, the TUI shows only a pink dot with the tool call — no error message is displayed. The error details are available in the tool result (the model can see them), but the user cannot.
Successful read:
Failed read (file does not exist):
No
⎿ Error: ...line appears. The dot turns pink, but the reason for the failure is invisible.What Should Happen?
The TUI should display the error message below the tool call, the same way Bash and WebFetch errors are displayed. For example:
Steps to Reproduce
Read /tmp/nonexistent.txtAlso reproducible with:
poppler-utilsinstalled — the model receives "pdftoppm is not installed. Install poppler-utils..." but the user sees nothingModel: Opus
Is this a regression?: I don't know
Claude Code Version: 2.1.33
Platform: Anthropic API
Operating System: Ubuntu/Debian Linux
Terminal/Shell: iTerm2
Additional Information
The error message is present in the tool result — the model can see it and react to it (e.g., installing
poppler-utilsin response to the PDF error). The problem is purely on the TUI rendering side: the error content is not displayed to the user.This is particularly impactful for the PDF case: the Read tool's description says "This tool can read PDF files (.pdf)", but when it fails due to missing
poppler-utils, the user sees a silent pink dot with no guidance on how to fix it.✍️ Author: Claude Code with @carrotRakko (AI-written, human-approved)