statusline-setup_skill

Overview

This skill guides you through configuring Claude Code's status line with customizable display options, visual progress bars, and cross-platform scripts for macOS/Linux and Windows. It walks through detecting the OS, collecting preferences via a simple wizard, creating the appropriate status line script, and updating your Claude Code settings to use the script. The result is a compact, informative status line showing model info, token usage, git branch, time, and other session data.

How this skill works

The skill detects the operating system and reads the user's settings file to check for an existing statusLine configuration. It runs a configuration wizard to collect display preferences (model name, token count, progress bar, directory, git branch, cost, duration, time, version). Based on choices it creates a bash or PowerShell script (backing up any existing script), updates settings.json to point to the script, and makes the shell script executable on Unix systems.

When to use it

• Setting up a new, informative status line for Claude Code
• Customizing which elements (model, tokens, git, time) appear in the status line
• Adding a visual progress bar to track context usage
• Switching between macOS/Linux and Windows status line implementations
• Automating status line installation and configuration during environment setup

Best practices

• Back up existing settings and statusline scripts before replacing them
• Install jq on macOS/Linux so the bash template can parse JSON input
• Test the generated script manually before adding it to automated startup
• Use conservative defaults for cost display to avoid exposing billing info publicly
• Keep the progress bar width and colors simple for terminal compatibility

Example use cases

• Developer wants a compact status line showing model name, token usage, and current git branch
• Ops engineer sets up cross-platform status line scripts for a team (bash for macOS/Linux, PowerShell for Windows)
• User enables session duration and cost for better tracking while using paid APIs
• Power user toggles off token count and keeps only a minimal time-and-version display
• Onboarding script automates status line creation and settings.json update for new workstations