Files
codex/codex-rs/app-server-client
Eric Traut 771a4e74ac Add thread/settings/update app-server API (#23502)
## Why

App-server clients need a way to update a thread's next-turn settings
without starting a turn, adding transcript content, or waiting for turn
lifecycle events. This gives settings UI a direct path for durable
thread settings while clients observe the eventual effective state
through a notification.

This is a simplified rework of PR
https://github.com/openai/codex/pull/22509. In particular, it changes
the `thread/settings/update` api to return immediately rather than
waiting and returning the effective (updated) thread settings. This
makes the new api consistent with `turn/start` and greatly reduces the
complexity of the implementation relative to the earlier attempt.

## What Changed

- Adds experimental `thread/settings/update` with partial-update request
fields and an empty acknowledgment response.
- Adds experimental `thread/settings/updated`, carrying full effective
`ThreadSettings` and scoped by `threadId` to subscribed clients for the
affected thread.
- Shares durable settings validation with `turn/start`, including
`sandboxPolicy` plus `permissions` rejection and `serviceTier: null`
clearing.
- Emits the same settings notification when `turn/start` overrides
change the stored effective thread settings.
- Regenerates app-server protocol schema fixtures and updates
`app-server/README.md`.
2026-05-20 11:03:20 -07:00
..

codex-app-server-client

Shared in-process app-server client used by conversational CLI surfaces:

  • codex-exec
  • codex-tui

Purpose

This crate centralizes startup and lifecycle management for an in-process codex-app-server runtime, so CLI clients do not need to duplicate:

  • app-server bootstrap and initialize handshake
  • in-memory request/event transport wiring
  • lifecycle orchestration around caller-provided startup identity
  • graceful shutdown behavior

Startup identity

Callers pass both the app-server SessionSource and the initialize client_info.name explicitly when starting the facade.

That keeps thread metadata (for example in thread/list and thread/read) aligned with the originating runtime without baking TUI/exec-specific policy into the shared client layer.

Transport model

The in-process path uses typed channels:

  • client -> server: ClientRequest / ClientNotification
  • server -> client: InProcessServerEvent
    • ServerRequest
    • ServerNotification
    • LegacyNotification

JSON serialization is still used at external transport boundaries (stdio/websocket), but the in-process hot path is typed.

Typed requests still receive app-server responses through the JSON-RPC result envelope internally. That is intentional: the in-process path is meant to preserve app-server semantics while removing the process boundary, not to introduce a second response contract.

Bootstrap behavior

The client facade starts an already-initialized in-process runtime, but thread bootstrap still follows normal app-server flow:

  • caller sends thread/start or thread/resume
  • app-server returns the immediate typed response
  • richer session metadata may arrive later as a SessionConfigured legacy event

Surfaces such as TUI and exec may therefore need a short bootstrap phase where they reconcile startup response data with later events.

Backpressure and shutdown

  • Queues are bounded and use DEFAULT_IN_PROCESS_CHANNEL_CAPACITY by default.
  • Full queues return explicit overload behavior instead of unbounded growth.
  • shutdown() performs a bounded graceful shutdown and then aborts if timeout is exceeded.

If the client falls behind on event consumption, the worker emits InProcessServerEvent::Lagged and may reject pending server requests so approval flows do not hang indefinitely behind a saturated queue.