continuedev / continuedev/continue

Ctrl+Backspace to stop generation overrides standard word-delete in chat input

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area:chat ide:vscode kind:bug os:windows
Dominant language
TypeScript
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Description

Before submitting your bug report
Relevant environment info
- OS: Windows
- Continue version: 2.0.0
- IDE version: vs code 1.126.0 
- Model: qwen3-coder-next
- config:
  
name: Main Config
version: 1.0.0
schema: v1
models:
  - name: qwen3-coder-next
    provider: ollama
    model: qwen3-coder-next
    roles:
      - chat
      - edit
      - apply
  - name: Qwen2.5-Coder 1.5B
    provider: ollama
    model: qwen2.5-coder:1.5b-base
    roles:
      - autocomplete
  - name: Nomic Embed
    provider: ollama
    model: nomic-embed-text:latest
    roles:
      - embed

  
  OR link to agent in Continue hub:
Description

Ctrl+Backspace. This shortcut is captured globally within the chat input field, which conflicts with the standard OS/editor behavior of Ctrl+Backspace deleting the word to the left of the cursor.

Expected behavior:
Ctrl+Backspace should only trigger Stop when the input field is not focused, or ideally shouldn't hijack a standard text-editing shortcut at all — similar to how #10647 flagged that Ctrl+Shift+Backspace ("Reject Diff") shouldn't override IntelliJ's native shortcut when there's no diff to reject. In this case, Stop should not override basic word-delete in the input box, especially since the two actions have no relationship to each other from the user's perspective.

Workaround: none currently — there doesn't appear to be a config.yaml or keybinding entry to remove/rebind this, since it isn't registered as a normal VS Code keybinding but instead handled inside the webview itself.

To reproduce

Steps to reproduce:

  1. Open the Continue chat panel and send a message so a response starts streaming.
  2. While the response is still streaming, click into the chat input box and try to use Ctrl+Backspace to delete a word you've typed.
  3. Instead of deleting a word, it triggers the Stop action.
Log output

Contributor guide

Open the contributing guide

First steps

  1. Read the whole issue, then the project's contributing guide.
  2. Comment on the issue to say you are picking it up — it saves two people doing the same work.
  3. Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
  4. Open a pull request that references the issue number.

Research direction

Start at the chat input webview's global shortcut handling for Ctrl+Backspace and trace how it invokes Stop while a response is streaming. Reproduce with the input focused, then verify that Ctrl+Backspace deletes the preceding word there while Stop still works when the input is not focused.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
typescript, vscode
Domain
developer-experience, frontend
Issue type
Bug
Difficulty
3/5
Estimated time
1-2 days
Activity status
Quiet
Clarity
Mostly clear
Newbie friendliness
64/100

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