You'll noticeTier: how much it should matter to you
3Useful: my rating, 1 to 5
3Signal: worth watching, 1 to 5
PluginsArea: what it touches
ImprovementsKind: in v2.1.229,
ImprovementsSection of the release
What
When a plugin installed from a command has no cached copy, Claude Code will not run its command if the plugin is disabled or if background command execution is turned off. Instead it shows a load error telling you to run claude plugin update in a terminal.
Details
The refusal is reported as command_source_inactive rather than a generic operation failure.
Usage
claude plugin update
Evidence
command_source_inactive
Strings lifted out of the shipped bundle, so the claim above can be checked against them.
Read from
Names in the bundleclaude plugin update
How sure we are
One source agreesOne thing we can check says the same as this entry.
Anthropic's release notes agreeFixed one-shot claude plugin commands leaving a stray liveness file that could prevent cleanup of outdated plugin versions
