There are two problems. 1) You have to click the Search button, instead of starting the search by pressing the Enter key. What should be the case is: if the user has configured IDETalk to send a message on pressing Enter, then pressing Enter in search should have the effect of pressing the Search button. 2) Searching for nothing at all brings up the entire search history, instead of complaining that you tried to search for nothing. Instead, IntellIj should implement a good UI for browsing past chats; this is a poor and counter-intuitive substitute.