feat(vscode): prevent system sleep during tasks

[JeanLuX]

Summary

Add opt-in, cross-platform system sleep prevention while VS Code agent tasks are actively running.

• Add the disabled-by-default kilo-code.new.preventSleepDuringTasks setting.
• Add a 30-minute active-execution limit per task; 0 removes only Kilo’s time limit.
• Add the localized Power settings panel, using a battery icon and a nested timeout field.
• Pause the active-time budget while a task awaits a question, permission, network recovery, or blocking suggestion.
• Do not prevent display sleep or screen locking.

Why

Long-running agent tasks can be interrupted by automatic system sleep. Existing operating-system power settings are still respected, but users need an explicit way to keep the system awake while work is actually executing.

The feature is opt-in because changing power behaviour should never be a surprise. The timeout is based on active execution rather than wall-clock time so time spent waiting for the user is not charged.

Behaviour

stateDiagram-v2
    [*] --> Running: task becomes busy/retry
    Running --> Paused: question / permission / network / blocking suggestion
    Paused --> Running: reply / recovery
    Running --> Finished: idle / completed / failed / cancelled / limit reached
    Paused --> Finished: task ends
    Finished --> [*]

Loading

flowchart LR
    A[Active task] --> B[Session sleep tracker]
    B --> C{Any task actively running?}
    C -- No --> D[Release native inhibitor]
    C -- Yes --> E[Shared native inhibitor]
    E --> F{Platform}
    F --> G[Windows: ES_SYSTEM_REQUIRED]
    F --> H[macOS: caffeinate -i]
    F --> I[Linux: systemd-inhibit]
    I --> J[Fallback: gnome-session-inhibit]
    G --> K[Ready signal]
    H --> K
    I --> K
    J --> K
    K --> L[Report inhibition active]

Loading

Implementation notes

• Native helpers use readiness checks, parent-lifetime watchdogs, reference counting, and bounded retry/fallback behaviour.
• Windows requests system execution state only; it never requests display-required state.
• macOS uses caffeinate -i.
• Linux prefers systemd-inhibit --what=sleep and falls back to gnome-session-inhibit --inhibit=suspend.
• Reconnection restores task status, titles, pending input, network waits, and blocking suggestions without overwriting newer SSE events.
• Multiple tasks keep one shared native helper alive until the final active task releases it.

Visual evidence

Kilo Settings:

VSCode status bar:

System notification (KDE Plasma 6.7.4)

Verification

Completed:

cd packages/kilo-vscode

bun test tests/unit/sleep-inhibitor.test.ts \
  tests/unit/kilo-provider-indexing-refresh.test.ts
# 44 passing, 0 failing, 126 assertions

bun run typecheck
bun run lint
bun run format:check
bun run knip
bun run check-kilocode-change

The VSIX archive was also built and verified with unzip -tq.

bun script/dev-snapshot.ts build stalled locally while invoking bun esbuild.js --production. As substitute verification, node esbuild.js --production completed successfully and the same @vscode/vsce packaging path produced a valid VSIX archive.

[JeanLuX]

Maybe duplicate #12974 ?

[kilo-code-bot]

Code Review Summary

Status: 2 Issues Found | Recommendation: Address before merge

Overview

Severity	Count
CRITICAL	0
WARNING	2
SUGGESTION	0

Issue Details (click to expand)

WARNING

File	Line	Issue
packages/kilo-vscode/src/services/sleep-inhibitor.ts	341	Spawn error while closing never clears this.child, so inhibition can stay dead
packages/kilo-vscode/src/services/sleep-inhibitor.ts	890	Reconnect restores suggestions from only the first known directory

Files Reviewed (57 files)

• packages/kilo-vscode/src/services/sleep-inhibitor.ts - 2 issues
• packages/kilo-vscode/tests/unit/sleep-inhibitor.test.ts - 0 issues
• packages/kilo-vscode/src/extension.ts - 0 issues
• packages/kilo-vscode/src/kilo-provider/early-message.ts - 0 issues
• packages/kilo-vscode/src/kilo-provider/sleep-settings.ts - 0 issues
• packages/kilo-vscode/webview-ui/src/components/settings/SleepTab.tsx - 0 issues
• packages/kilo-vscode/webview-ui/src/components/settings/Settings.tsx - 0 issues
• packages/kilo-vscode/webview-ui/src/context/config.tsx - 0 issues
• packages/kilo-vscode/package.json - 0 issues
• .changeset/prevent-task-sleep.md - 0 issues
• Host/webview i18n, README, icon, CSS, and message types - 0 issues

Fix these issues in Kilo Cloud

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_{Reviewed by grok-4.6 · Input: 191.3K · Output: 20.7K · Cached: 968.6K}

_{Review guidance: REVIEW.md from base branch main}

[marius-kilocode]

@JeanLuX thanks for it. We probably would ship this instead: #12974 . It's currently a bit tricky to get through, due to enterprise compliance questions.

[marius-kilocode]

It might make sense maybe to ship this as optional plugin. I haven't tested if that is possible, yet.

[JeanLuX]

No problem if you prefer the other one. I had not seen it before starting this work, but since I had already completed it, I thought I would put it forward anyway, just in case.

As for compliance within the company, I am having trouble understanding the concern. Why would this raise a compliance issue, given that the feature can be disabled, especially since it is disabled by default? Could you tell me more about it?