Introduction

In the DSH plugin ecosystem, community plugins can extend host capabilities as independent bundle layers. For developers using DeepSeek Harness (DSH), a common issue after accumulating many sidebar sessions is that archived sessions are difficult to find, chat content lacks a search entry point, and cleaning up local session records raises concerns about accidental deletion.

dsh-chat-manager addresses these scenarios by offering archive browsing, chat history search, session recovery, and secure permanent deletion directly within the DSH native sidebar. It is a community plugin maintained by WSL043 and provided under the MIT license, with no affiliation or endorsement from DeepSeek. The community directory referenced here is not the DeepSeek official app store, and the plugin exists as a non-official community project.

What is it

dsh-chat-manager is defined as a tool to search, recover, and securely clean up sessions within the DeepSeek Harness native sidebar.

It addresses three types of operations within the DSH session list:

  • Recovering archived sessions
  • Searching for archived sessions by session name, workspace, or chat content
  • Adding a secondary confirmation before deleting local session records

Core Features

  • Archive Management: Open archived sessions in the native sidebar
  • Chat History Search: Search archived sessions by session name, workspace, or user/assistant chat content
  • One-click Restore: Restore a session to its original workspace location
  • Secure Permanent Delete: Perform a secondary confirmation before deletion; safely stop running tasks before deleting local session records

Installation and Activation

First, install a specific version using the standard DSH command:

dsh plugin --profile web add dsh-chat-manager@1.3.0

This command adds the plugin bundle configuration for dsh-chat-manager to the web profile. Once installed, save your work and restart once using the standard DSH procedure to apply the new bundle configuration.

Typical Usage

Managing Archives

  1. Click the archive icon in the sidebar header area to open the archive.
  2. Browse all archives directly, or search by session name, workspace, and user/assistant chat content.
  3. Click Restore to return the session to its original workspace location.

Permanent Delete

  1. Open the native action menu on the right side of the target session in the sidebar.
  2. Select Delete Session.
  3. Verify the session name in the confirmation popup and confirm permanent deletion again; you can also cancel at any time.

If the target session has running tasks, the plugin will safely stop them before deleting the local session records.

Updates and Uninstallation

To update, continue using the standard DSH command to install the target npm version. When using v1.3.0:

dsh plugin --profile web add dsh-chat-manager@1.3.0

Uninstalling only removes the plugin’s bundle layer; it does not delete any sessions:

dsh plugin --profile web remove dsh-chat-manager

After completing installation, update, or uninstall, restart using the standard DSH procedure to recombine the configuration.

Applicable Scenarios and Notes

Suitable for the following scenarios:

  • Need to recover archived sessions in the DSH native sidebar
  • Need to search for archived sessions by session name, workspace, or user/assistant chat content
  • Need to add a mandatory secondary confirmation before deleting local session records

Special attention is required before using permanent delete:

  • Permanent deletion cannot be undone; please back up any content you wish to keep separately.
  • The secondary confirmation is a mandatory step; canceling will not send a deletion request.
  • The deletion scope is limited to the exclusive directory of the target session explicitly confirmed by the user. It will not delete other sessions, other plugin data, external attachments, cache, indexes, logs, backups, or cloud/synced copies.
  • Sessions stored in non-JSONL formats or sessions where the host lacks the ability to safely stop tasks will reject forced deletion and report as incomplete.
  • If the system refuses to clean up, the plugin will report that it cannot confirm successful deletion and will not falsely report partial completion as success.
  • Please confirm you have the authority to handle the target data before deletion and comply with applicable data retention, audit, and privacy requirements.

Before installation, you should also verify the source code, license, and project source credibility. The plugin runs with the current dsh process permissions, so confirming the project’s credibility before installation is crucial.

Compatibility is based on the latest version of DeepSeek Harness recorded in the package metadata. Do not rely on documentation from the main branch for installation.

Conclusion

The value of dsh-chat-manager lies in performing session archiving, searching, restoring, and secure deletion directly within the DSH native sidebar: archived sessions are easy to find, chat content is searchable, and there is an extra mandatory confirmation before deletion. It does not replace DSH’s core session mechanism but supplements session management capabilities via the plugin bundle layer; if you do not wish to use this method, you can uninstall the plugin, and existing sessions will not be deleted.

This article is described using the package name dsh-chat-manager from the installation command. The page addresses provided in this article’s materials are as follows; please refer to the current display on the site when visiting:

  • GitHub: https://github.com/WSL043/dsh-native-session-manager
  • Community Directory: https://www.skillhub.cn/plugins/WSL043/dsh-native-session-manager