This PR adds the API V2 version of the command‑execution approval flow
for the shell tool.
This PR wires the new RPC (`item/commandExecution/requestApproval`, V2
only) and related events (`item/started`, `item/completed`, and
`item/commandExecution/delta`, which are emitted in both V1 and V2)
through the app-server
protocol. The new approval RPC is only sent when the user initiates a
turn with the new `turn/start` API so we don't break backwards
compatibility with VSCE.
The approach I took was to make as few changes to the Codex core as
possible, leveraging existing `EventMsg` core events, and translating
those in app-server. I did have to add additional fields to
`EventMsg::ExecCommandEndEvent` to capture the command's input so that
app-server can statelessly transform these events to a
`ThreadItem::CommandExecution` item for the `item/completed` event.
Once we stabilize the API and it's complete enough for our partners, we
can work on migrating the core to be aware of command execution items as
a first-class concept.
**Note**: We'll need followup work to make sure these APIs work for the
unified exec tool, but will wait til that's stable and landed before
doing a pass on app-server.
Example payloads below:
```
{
"method": "item/started",
"params": {
"item": {
"aggregatedOutput": null,
"command": "/bin/zsh -lc 'touch /tmp/should-trigger-approval'",
"cwd": "/Users/owen/repos/codex/codex-rs",
"durationMs": null,
"exitCode": null,
"id": "call_lNWWsbXl1e47qNaYjFRs0dyU",
"parsedCmd": [
{
"cmd": "touch /tmp/should-trigger-approval",
"type": "unknown"
}
],
"status": "inProgress",
"type": "commandExecution"
}
}
}
```
```
{
"id": 0,
"method": "item/commandExecution/requestApproval",
"params": {
"itemId": "call_lNWWsbXl1e47qNaYjFRs0dyU",
"parsedCmd": [
{
"cmd": "touch /tmp/should-trigger-approval",
"type": "unknown"
}
],
"reason": "Need to create file in /tmp which is outside workspace sandbox",
"risk": null,
"threadId": "019a93e8-0a52-7fe3-9808-b6bc40c0989a",
"turnId": "1"
}
}
```
```
{
"id": 0,
"result": {
"acceptSettings": {
"forSession": false
},
"decision": "accept"
}
}
```
```
{
"params": {
"item": {
"aggregatedOutput": null,
"command": "/bin/zsh -lc 'touch /tmp/should-trigger-approval'",
"cwd": "/Users/owen/repos/codex/codex-rs",
"durationMs": 224,
"exitCode": 0,
"id": "call_lNWWsbXl1e47qNaYjFRs0dyU",
"parsedCmd": [
{
"cmd": "touch /tmp/should-trigger-approval",
"type": "unknown"
}
],
"status": "completed",
"type": "commandExecution"
}
}
}
```
This adds support for a new variant of the shell tool behind a flag. To
test, run `codex` with `--enable shell_command_tool`, which will
register the tool with Codex under the name `shell_command` that accepts
the following shape:
```python
{
command: str
workdir: str | None,
timeout_ms: int | None,
with_escalated_permissions: bool | None,
justification: str | None,
}
```
This is comparable to the existing tool registered under
`shell`/`container.exec`. The primary difference is that it accepts
`command` as a `str` instead of a `str[]`. The `shell_command` tool
executes by running `execvp(["bash", "-lc", command])`, though the exact
arguments to `execvp(3)` depend on the user's default shell.
The hypothesis is that this will simplify things for the model. For
example, on Windows, instead of generating:
```json
{"command": ["pwsh.exe", "-NoLogo", "-Command", "ls -Name"]}
```
The model could simply generate:
```json
{"command": "ls -Name"}
```
As part of this change, I extracted some logic out of `user_shell.rs` as
`Shell::derive_exec_args()` so that it can be reused in
`codex-rs/core/src/tools/handlers/shell.rs`. Note the original code
generated exec arg lists like:
```javascript
["bash", "-lc", command]
["zsh", "-lc", command]
["pwsh.exe", "-NoProfile", "-Command", command]
```
Using `-l` for Bash and Zsh, but then specifying `-NoProfile` for
PowerShell seemed inconsistent to me, so I changed this in the new
implementation while also adding a `use_login_shell: bool` option to
make this explicit. If we decide to add a `login: bool` to
`ShellCommandToolCallParams` like we have for unified exec:
807e2c27f0/codex-rs/core/src/tools/handlers/unified_exec.rs (L33-L34)
Then this should make it straightforward to support.
Adds AgentMessageContentDelta, ReasoningContentDelta,
ReasoningRawContentDelta item streaming events while maintaining
compatibility for old events.
---------
Co-authored-by: Owen Lin <owen@openai.com>
In this PR, I am exploring migrating task kind to an invocation of
Codex. The main reason would be getting rid off multiple
`ConversationHistory` state and streamlining our context/history
management.
This approach depends on opening a channel between the sub-codex and
codex. This channel is responsible for forwarding `interactive`
(`approvals`) and `non-interactive` events. The `task` is responsible
for handling those events.
This opens the door for implementing `codex as a tool`, replacing
`compact` and `review`, and potentially subagents.
One consideration is this code is very similar to `app-server` specially
in the approval part. If in the future we wanted an interactive
`sub-codex` we should consider using `codex-mcp`
feature: Add "!cmd" user shell execution
This change lets users run local shell commands directly from the TUI by
prefixing their input with ! (e.g. !ls). Output is truncated to keep the
exec cell usable, and Ctrl-C cleanly
interrupts long-running commands (e.g. !sleep 10000).
**Summary of changes**
- Route Op::RunUserShellCommand through a dedicated UserShellCommandTask
(core/src/tasks/user_shell.rs), keeping the task logic out of codex.rs.
- Reuse the existing tool router: the task constructs a ToolCall for the
local_shell tool and relies on ShellHandler, so no manual MCP tool
lookup is required.
- Emit exec lifecycle events (ExecCommandBegin/ExecCommandEnd) so the
TUI can show command metadata, live output, and exit status.
**End-to-end flow**
**TUI handling**
1. ChatWidget::submit_user_message (TUI) intercepts messages starting
with !.
2. Non-empty commands dispatch Op::RunUserShellCommand { command };
empty commands surface a help hint.
3. No UserInput items are created, so nothing is enqueued for the model.
**Core submission loop**
4. The submission loop routes the op to handlers::run_user_shell_command
(core/src/codex.rs).
5. A fresh TurnContext is created and Session::spawn_user_shell_command
enqueues UserShellCommandTask.
**Task execution**
6. UserShellCommandTask::run emits TaskStartedEvent, formats the
command, and prepares a ToolCall targeting local_shell.
7. ToolCallRuntime::handle_tool_call dispatches to ShellHandler.
**Shell tool runtime**
8. ShellHandler::run_exec_like launches the process via the unified exec
runtime, honoring sandbox and shell policies, and emits
ExecCommandBegin/End.
9. Stdout/stderr are captured for the UI, but the task does not turn the
resulting ToolOutput into a model response.
**Completion**
10. After ExecCommandEnd, the task finishes without an assistant
message; the session marks it complete and the exec cell displays the
final output.
**Conversation context**
- The command and its output never enter the conversation history or the
model prompt; the flow is local-only.
- Only exec/task events are emitted for UI rendering.
**Demo video**
https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/fcd114b0-4304-4448-a367-a04c43e0b996
Today `sub_id` is an ID of a single incoming Codex Op submition. We then
associate all events triggered by this operation using the same
`sub_id`.
At the same time we are also creating a TurnContext per submission and
we'd like to start associating some events (item added/item completed)
with an entire turn instead of just the operation that started it.
Using turn context when sending events give us flexibility to change
notification scheme.
Adds a new ItemStarted event and delivers UserMessage as the first item
type (more to come).
Renames `InputItem` to `UserInput` considering we're using the `Item`
suffix for actual items.
Extracting tasks in a module and start abstraction behind a Trait (more
to come on this but each task will be tackled in a dedicated PR)
The goal was to drop the ActiveTask and to have a (potentially) set of
tasks during each turn
