session-recovery

Original：🇺🇸 English

Translated

Troubleshoot Claude Code session issues. TRIGGERS - No conversations found, missing sessions, session corruption.

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Sourceterrylica/cc-skills

Added on2026-02-07

NPX Install

npx skill4agent add terrylica/cc-skills session-recovery

SKILL.md Content

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Claude Code Session Recovery Skill

When to Use This Skill

Use this skill when:

"No conversations found to resume" when running
```
claude -r
```
New conversations not creating session files
Sessions appearing in wrong locations (
```
/tmp/
```
instead of
```
~/.claude/projects/
```
)
Session history missing after environment changes
IDE/terminal settings affecting session creation
Need to migrate or recover 600+ legacy sessions

Quick Reference

Official Session Storage

Standard Location:

~/.claude/projects/

Structure:

~/.claude/projects/
├── -home-username-my-project/     # Encoded absolute path
│   └── 364695f1-13e7-4cbb-ad4b-0eb416feb95d.jsonl
└── -tmp-another-project/
    └── a8e39846-ceca-421d-b4bd-3ba0eb1b3145.jsonl

Format: One JSON event per line (JSONL), UUID-based filenames

Critical Pitfall: HOME Variable

Problem

Claude Code uses

$HOME

environment variable to determine session storage location. If

$HOME

is incorrect, sessions go to wrong directory or disappear.

Symptoms

```
claude -r
```
shows "No conversations found to resume"
New conversations work but files don't appear in expected location
Sessions found in
```
/tmp/
```
or other unexpected paths
Works on one machine but not another

Diagnosis

bash

/usr/bin/env bash << 'PREFLIGHT_EOF'
# Step 1: Check current HOME
echo "Current HOME: $HOME"

# Step 2: Check system expectation
echo "Expected HOME: $(getent passwd $(whoami) | cut -d: -f6)"

# Step 3: Find where Claude is actually writing
find /tmp -name "*.jsonl" -path "*/.claude/projects/*" 2>/dev/null
PREFLIGHT_EOF

Reference Documentation

For detailed diagnostic steps and solutions, see:

Troubleshooting Guide - Detailed diagnostic procedures and fixes

Troubleshooting

Issue	Cause	Solution
"No conversations found"	Wrong HOME variable	Verify `$HOME` matches expected user directory
Sessions in /tmp/	HOME set incorrectly	Fix HOME in shell profile, restart terminal
Session files missing	Disk space or permissions	Check `~/.claude/projects/` permissions and disk
Wrong project sessions shown	Path encoding mismatch	Check encoded path matches current working directory
Sessions not persisting	File system issues	Verify write permissions to `~/.claude/projects/`
IDE sessions separate	Different HOME per environment	Ensure consistent HOME across terminal and IDE
Legacy sessions not visible	Migration not complete	See migration section in TROUBLESHOOTING.md
UUID filename corruption	Incomplete writes	Check for partial .jsonl files, remove corrupt ones