## Description
This PR adds a new `historyMode = "legacy" | "paginated"` to `Thread`.
This will be stored in `SessionMeta` in the JSONL rollout file and as a
new column in the SQLite thread_metadata table, and exposed on
`thread/start` and on the `Thread` object in app-server.
## What changed
- Added canonical `ThreadHistoryMode` with `legacy` and `paginated`,
defaulting old and new SessionMeta to `legacy`.
- Carried `history_mode` through core session config, ThreadStore stored
metadata, local/in-memory stores, rollout metadata extraction, and the
existing SQLite `threads` table.
- Added experimental `historyMode` to app-server v2 `Thread` and
`thread/start`.
- Made paginated stored threads metadata-discoverable but unsupported
for legacy full-history reads, `load_history`, live resume, and create
paths.
- Regenerated app-server schema fixtures and added
protocol/state/thread-store/app-server coverage for persistence and
fail-closed behavior.
## Compatibility floor
Because users may be running various versions of Codex binaries on the
same machine (TUI, Codex App, etc.), we will need to establish a
compatibility floor for upcoming paginated threads, which will change
how thread storage reads and writes work.
The overall plan here:
```
Release N:
- Add historyMode to SessionMeta / Thread / SQLite metadata.
- Teach binaries to understand paginated threads.
- If a binary sees `historyMode="paginated"` but does not support the paginated contract, it refuses to resume/mutate the thread.
- Default remains `"legacy"`.
Release N+1:
- First-party clients start opting into paginated threads where appropriate.
- Internal dogfood / staged rollout.
- Measure old-client usage and paginated-thread unsupported errors.
Release N+2:
- Only after Release N+ is overwhelmingly deployed, make paginated the default.
- Accept that a small tail of N-1-or-older binaries may not understand paginated threads.
```
The important behavior change is fail-closed handling for a binary that
encounters a persisted `paginated` thread before it knows how to fully
support paginated history. In app-server, if a thread is `paginated`, we
will:
- allow metadata-only discovery paths like `thread/list` and
`thread/read(includeTurns=false)`, so clients can still see the thread
and inspect its `historyMode`
- reject legacy full-history/live-thread paths like
`thread/read(includeTurns=true)` and `thread/resume` with an unsupported
JSON-RPC error
- avoid silently treating an unknown or future `historyMode` as `legacy`
Under the hood, the ThreadStore layer also rejects legacy operations
that would need to load or replay the full thread history for a
paginated thread. That gives us the behavior we want for Release N:
future paginated threads are visible, but this binary fails closed
instead of trying to operate on them as if they were legacy threads.
## Why
`selectedCapabilityRoots` is durable thread intent: “use this capability
root from environment `worker`.”
The important product assumption is:
> One environment ID always names the same logical executor and stable
contents.
`worker` does not silently change from executor A to an unrelated
executor B. The process-local connection handle for `worker` can still
be replaced while Codex is running, though, for example when
`environment/add` registers a fresh handle for the same logical
environment.
The thread should persist only the stable selection. Each model step
should pair that selection with the exact ready handle captured for that
step.
## The boundary
```text
persisted thread intent
plugin@1 -> environment "worker"
|
| capture the current step
v
model-step view
unavailable, or
plugin@1 + worker's exact captured ready handle
```
The environment ID is the stable identity and cache key. The
`Arc<Environment>` is only a process-local handle retained so consumers
of one model step use the same captured environment. It is never
persisted and it does not imply different environment contents.
## What changes
### Persist the stable selection
Selected roots are written into `SessionMeta` and restored with the
thread. Forked subagents inherit the same selections, including
bounded-history forks.
Only stable data is persisted: root ID, environment ID, and root path.
### Capture readiness together with the exact handle
The environment snapshot records:
```rust
environment_id -> Some(Arc<Environment>) // ready in this step
environment_id -> None // still starting in this step
```
This prevents readiness and execution from coming from different
registry snapshots.
For example:
```text
step snapshot: worker -> handle A, ready
environment/add: worker -> fresh handle B for the same logical environment
current step: plugin@1 still uses captured handle A
```
Without carrying handle A in the snapshot, the resolver could combine “A
was ready” with handle B and treat B as ready before it had finished
starting.
This does not change cache invalidation. Stable capability metadata
remains identified by environment ID and capability root. Replacing a
process-local handle under the same stable environment ID does not
invalidate or rediscover that metadata.
### Resolve availability per model step
- A ready captured environment produces resolved roots using its
captured handle.
- A starting, missing, or failed environment is omitted from that step.
- A selected lazy environment that is outside the turn's captured
environment set is asked to start, and a later step can observe it as
ready.
- No capability files are scanned here.
Transient transport disconnects remain the remote client's reconnect
concern. This PR models initial attachment/readiness; it does not add
live socket-connectivity state.
## Example
```text
thread selection: plugin@1 -> environment "worker"
step 1: worker is starting -> plugin@1 unavailable
step 2: worker is ready -> plugin@1 resolves through worker's captured handle
step 3: fresh local handle -> current step remains pinned; a later step captures its own view
```
Temporary unavailability does not discard the durable selection. Later
PRs can retain stable metadata caches while projecting only currently
available capabilities into model-visible World State.
## Compatibility
The app-server request shape does not change. Older rollouts without
`selected_capability_roots` deserialize to an empty list.
## Stack
1. **This PR:** persist stable selected roots and resolve them through
an exact model-step handle.
2. #29960: cache stable skill metadata and project available skills into
World State.
3. #29946: cache stable plugin declarations and manage the separate live
MCP runtime.
## Why
Work(TPP) threads can be launched from the Desktop app, but if they all
keep the Desktop app's default originator then downstream attribution
cannot distinguish local Work launches from cloud-backed Work launches.
`thread/start.serviceName` already carries that launch signal, while
`SessionMeta.originator` is the durable thread-level value that survives
resume and fork.
This change converts the Desktop Work service names into an effective
originator at thread creation time, persists that originator with the
thread, and keeps using it for later model requests and memory writes.
## What changed
- Map `CODEX_WORK_LOCAL` and `CODEX_WORK_CLOUD` service names to
per-thread originators, while preserving
`CODEX_INTERNAL_ORIGINATOR_OVERRIDE` as the highest-precedence override.
- Persist the effective originator in `SessionMeta.originator`, read it
back on resume/fork, and inherit the parent originator for subagent
spawns when there is no persisted session metadata.
- Handle truncated `SpawnAgentForkMode::LastNTurns` forks by falling
back to the live parent originator when the forked history no longer
includes `SessionMeta`.
- Thread the per-thread originator through Responses headers,
websocket/compaction request paths, thread-store creation, rollout
metadata, and memory stage-one telemetry.
## Verification
- `just test -p codex-core
agent::control::tests::spawn_thread_subagent_inherits_parent_originator_without_fork
agent::control::tests::spawn_thread_subagent_fork_last_n_turns_inherits_parent_originator_without_session_meta
thread_manager::tests::originator_override_precedes_service_name_remapping`
- `just test -p codex-core
agent::control::tests::resume_thread_subagent_restores_stored_metadata_and_effective_multi_agent_mode`
- `just test -p codex-memories-write`
- `just fix -p codex-core -p codex-memories-write`
- `git diff --check`
## Why
PR #29494 made context-window IDs visible to the model by wrapping the
token-budget window payload in `<context_window>`, but rollout JSONL
consumers still could not see the initial window identity by tailing the
session file. Compacted rollout items carry window IDs only after
compaction has happened, so a session with no compaction had no durable
JSONL record for window 0.
This change gives tailing consumers a stable initial-window record at
session creation time.
## What Changed
- Added `session_meta.context_window.window_id` for the initial
context-window identity.
- `CreateThreadParams` now requires `initial_window_id: String`, so
thread-store callers cannot accidentally create new threads without
window-0 metadata.
- Live thread creation derives the persisted initial window ID from the
same `AutoCompactWindowIds` used to initialize `SessionState`, keeping
runtime state and JSONL metadata aligned.
- Rollout reconstruction uses `session_meta.context_window.window_id` as
the initial-window fallback and derives `window_number = 0`,
`first_window_id = window_id`, and `previous_window_id = None`
internally.
- Fork reconstruction intentionally uses the same rollout reconstruction
path; consumers that need to distinguish copied initial-window metadata
can use the rollout `thread_id`.
- Legacy compactions without `window_number` still use compaction-count
fallback accounting instead of being reset to window 0 by the
initial-window fallback.
- Compacted rollout metadata still takes precedence once compaction
records exist, preserving the richer chain fields there.
## JSONL Shape
Real rollout JSONL is one object per line. This example is expanded for
readability, but shows the new initial `session_meta.context_window`
record followed by the existing compacted rollout item shape that also
carries window IDs:
```jsonl
{
"timestamp": "2026-06-22T12:00:00.000Z",
"type": "session_meta",
"payload": {
"session_id": "<THREAD_ID>",
"id": "<THREAD_ID>",
"timestamp": "2026-06-22T12:00:00.000Z",
"cwd": "/repo",
"originator": "codex",
"cli_version": "0.0.0",
"source": "cli",
"model_provider": "<MODEL_PROVIDER>",
"context_window": {
"window_id": "<INITIAL_WINDOW_ID>"
}
}
}
...
{
"timestamp": "2026-06-22T12:34:56.000Z",
"type": "compacted",
"payload": {
"message": "<COMPACTION_SUMMARY>",
"replacement_history": [
"..."
],
"window_number": 1,
"first_window_id": "<INITIAL_WINDOW_ID>",
"previous_window_id": "<INITIAL_WINDOW_ID>",
"window_id": "<NEXT_WINDOW_ID>"
}
}
```
The nested `context_window` object is intentional: it gives rollout
consumers a stable namespace for context-window metadata while only
writing the non-derivable initial `window_id`. For the initial window,
`window_number`, `first_window_id`, and `previous_window_id` are derived
internally instead of being written to the rollout.
## Verification
- `just test -p codex-protocol`
- `just test -p codex-rollout
recorder_materializes_on_flush_with_pending_items`
- `just test -p codex-core reconstruct_history`
- `just test -p codex-core
record_initial_history_reconstructs_forked_transcript`
- `just test -p codex-thread-store`
- `just test -p codex-state`
- `just test -p codex-app-server
thread_read_returns_summary_without_turns`
- `just test -p codex-rollout persistence_metrics`
## Summary
A cold-resumed subagent kept its durable thread ID but could receive a
new session ID, splitting one agent tree across multiple sessions after
a restart.
Persist the root session ID in every rollout `SessionMeta`, carry it
through thread creation, and restore it before initializing the resumed
`Session` and `AgentControl`.
## Behavior
For a nested agent tree:
```text
root session R
parent thread P
child thread C
```
The child rollout stores:
```text
session_id: R
parent_thread_id: P
id: C
```
After a cold resume, the child still belongs to root session `R` while
its immediate parent remains `P`. The integration coverage uses distinct
values for all three IDs so it catches restoring the session from
`parent_thread_id`.
## Legacy rollouts
Previous rollouts have `id` but no `session_id`. `SessionMetaLine`
deserialization treats a missing `session_id` as `id`, keeping those
files readable, listable, and resumable. When a legacy subagent is
resumed through its root, that synthesized child ID no longer overrides
the inherited root-scoped `AgentControl`. New rollouts always persist
the explicit root session ID.
## Why
Clients that display or coordinate spawned subagents need an
authoritative snapshot of a thread's immediate spawned children when
they connect to app-server or recover after missing live events.
`thread/list` cannot query by parent, so clients must otherwise scan
unrelated threads or reconstruct relationships from rollout history and
transient events.
The direct spawn relationship already exists in persisted
`thread_spawn_edges` state. Review and Guardian threads do not
participate in that lifecycle and are intentionally outside this
filter's scope.
## What changed
This adds an experimental `parentThreadId` filter to `thread/list`.
Parent-filtered requests return direct spawned children from persisted
state while preserving the existing response shape, explicit filters,
sorting, and timestamp-only cursor behavior. The lookup does not read
rollout transcripts or recursively return descendants.
Supersedes #25112 with the narrower `thread/list` filter approach.
## How it works
1. An experimental client passes a valid thread ID as `parentThreadId`.
2. App-server routes the list through the existing thread-store and
state-database boundaries.
3. SQLite selects threads whose IDs have a direct persisted spawn edge
from that parent.
4. Omitted provider and source filters include all values; explicit
filters keep ordinary `thread/list` semantics.
5. Grandchildren, Review threads, and Guardian threads are excluded.
## Verification
State (144 tests), rollout (69 tests), and focused app-server
thread-list (31 tests) suites passed. Scoped Clippy checks and
repository formatting also passed. Coverage includes direct spawned
children, omitted grandchildren, pagination, malformed IDs, mixed source
kinds, explicit filters, and operation without rollout files.
Stack split from #25708. Original PR intentionally left open. This
second PR persists multi-agent runtime metadata through thread creation,
rollout recording, and thread storage.
## Why
This PR
https://github.com/openai/codex/pull/24161#discussion_r3325692763
revealed a subagent data modeling issue, where we overloaded
`forked_from_id` to also mean `parent_thread_id`. That's incorrect since
guardian and review subagents can be a subagent and NOT fork the main
thread's history.
The solution here is to explicitly store a new `parent_thread_id` on
`SessionMeta`, alongside `forked_from_id` which already exists. While
we're at it, also expose it in the app-server protocol on the `Thread`
object.
A thread->subagent relationship and a fork of thread history are
orthogonal concepts.
## What Changed
- Added top-level `parent_thread_id` persistence on `SessionMeta` and
runtime/session plumbing through `SessionConfiguredEvent`,
`CodexSpawnArgs`, `SessionConfiguration`, `ThreadConfigSnapshot`,
`TurnContext`, and `ModelClient`.
- Made turn metadata, request headers, analytics, and subagent-start
events read the separate runtime/top-level parent field instead of
deriving general parent lineage from `SessionSource` or
`forked_from_thread_id`.
- Passed parent lineage separately at delegated subagent, review,
guardian, agent-job, and multi-agent spawn construction sites;
copied-history fork lineage remains derived only from `InitialHistory`.
- Persisted and exposed parent lineage through rollout/thread-store
projections and app-server v2 `Thread.parentThreadId`.
- Updated app-server README text and regenerated app-server schema
fixtures for the additive `parentThreadId` response field.
- make ThreadStore::update_thread_metadata accept a broad range of
metadata patches
- keep ThreadStore::append_items as raw canonical history append (no
metadata side effects)
- in the local store, write these metadata updates to a combination of
sqlite and rollout jsonl files for backwards-compat. It special cases
which fields need to go into jsonl vs sqlite vs whatever, confining the
awkwardness to just this implementation
- in remote stores we can simply persist the metadata directly to a
database, no special casing required.
- move the "implicit metadata updates triggered by appending rollout
items" from the RolloutRecorder (which is local-threadstore-specific) to
the LiveThread layer above the ThreadStore, inside of a private helper
utility called ThreadMetadataSync. LiveThread calls ThreadStore
append_items and update_metadata separately.
- Add a generic update metadata method to ThreadManager that works on
both live threads and "cold" threads
- Call that ThreadManager method from app server code, so app server
doesn't need to worry about whether the thread is live or not
## Why
Reverts #20689 to restore the previous optional state DB plumbing. The
conflict resolution keeps the newer installation ID and session/thread
identity changes that landed after #20689, while removing the mandatory
state DB and agent graph store dependency from ThreadManager
construction.
## What changed
- Restored `Option<StateDbHandle>` through app-server, MCP server,
prompt debug, and test entry points.
- Removed the `codex-core` dependency on `codex-agent-graph-store` and
reverted descendant lookup back to the existing state DB path when
available.
- Kept newer `installation_id` forwarding by passing it beside the
optional DB handle.
- Kept local thread-name updates working when the optional state DB
handle is absent.
## Validation
- `git diff --check`
- `cargo test -p codex-thread-store`
- `cargo test -p codex-state -p codex-rollout -p
codex-app-server-protocol`
- Attempted `env CARGO_INCREMENTAL=0 cargo test -p codex-core -p
codex-app-server -p codex-app-server-client -p codex-mcp-server -p
codex-thread-manager-sample -p codex-tui`; blocked locally by a rustc
ICE while compiling `v8 v146.4.0` with `rustc 1.93.0 (254b59607
2026-01-19)` on `aarch64-apple-darwin`.
## Summary
- make `thread_source` an explicit optional thread-level field on
`thread/start`, `thread/fork`, and returned thread payloads
- persist `thread_source` in rollout/session metadata so resumed live
threads retain the original value
- replace the old best-effort `session_source` -> `thread_source`
mapping with an explicit caller-supplied analytics classification
## Why
Before this change, analytics `thread_source` was populated by a
best-effort mapping from `session_source`. `session_source` describes
the runtime/client surface, not the actual thread-level origin, so that
projection was not accurate enough to distinguish cases such as `user`,
`subagent`, `memory_consolidation`, and future thread origins reliably.
Making `thread_source` explicit keeps one thread-level analytics field
while letting callers provide the real classification directly instead
of recovering it indirectly from `session_source`.
## Impact
For new analytics events, `thread_source` now reflects the explicit
thread-level classification supplied by the caller rather than an
inferred value derived from `session_source`. Existing protocol fields
remain optional; callers that omit `threadSource` now produce `null`
instead of a best-effort inferred value.
## Validation
- `just write-app-server-schema`
- `cargo test -p codex-analytics -p codex-core -p
codex-app-server-protocol --no-run`
- `cargo test -p codex-app-server-protocol
generated_ts_optional_nullable_fields_only_in_params`
- `cargo test -p codex-analytics
thread_initialized_event_serializes_expected_shape`
- `cargo test -p codex-core
resume_stopped_thread_from_rollout_preserves_thread_source`
## Why
We want the agent graph store to be passed down the stack as a real
dependency, the same way we already treat the thread store.
This will let us inject the agent graph store as a real dependency and
support implementations other than the local SQLite-backed one. Right
now most code instantiates a state DB and an agent graph store
just-in-time. Ideally, we would not depend on the state DB directly but
only read through the higher-level interfaces.
This change makes the dependency boundaries explicit and moves state DB
initialization to process bootstrap instead of hiding it inside local
store implementations.
## What changed
- `ThreadManager` now requires a `StateDbHandle` and an
`AgentGraphStore` at construction time instead of treating them as
optional internals.
- The local store constructors no longer lazily initialize SQLite.
Callers now initialize the state DB once per process and use that shared
handle to build:
- `LocalThreadStore`
- `LocalAgentGraphStore`
- App bootstraps (`app-server`, `mcp-server`, `prompt_debug`, and the
thread-manager sample) now initialize the state DB up front and inject
the resulting handle down the stack.
- `app-server` now consistently uses its process-scoped state DB handle
instead of reopening SQLite or trying to recover it from loaded threads.
- Device-key storage now reuses the shared state DB handle instead of
maintaining its own lazy opener.
- The thread archive / descendant traversal paths now use the injected
`AgentGraphStore` instead of reaching through local
thread-store-specific state.
## Verification
- `cargo check -p codex-core -p codex-thread-store -p codex-app-server
-p codex-mcp-server -p codex-thread-manager-sample --tests`
- `cargo test -p codex-thread-store`
- `cargo test -p codex-core
thread_manager_accepts_separate_agent_graph_store_and_thread_store --
--nocapture`
- `cargo test -p codex-app-server
thread_archive_archives_spawned_descendants -- --nocapture`
- Build one app-server process ThreadStore from startup config and share
it with ThreadManager and CodexMessageProcessor.
- Remove per-thread/fork store reconstruction so effective thread config
cannot switch the persistence backend.
- Add params to ThreadStore create/resume for specifying thread
metadata, since otherwise the metadata from store creation would be used
(incorrectly).
Begin migrating the thread write codepaths to ThreadStore.
This starts using ThreadStore inside of core session code, not only in
the app server code.
Rework the interfaces around thread recording/persistence. We're left
with the following:
* `ThreadManager`: owns the process-level registry of loaded threads and
handles cross-thread orchestration: start, resume, fork, lookup, remove,
and route ops to running CodexThreads.
* `CodexThread`: represents one loaded/running thread from the outside.
It is the handle app-server and callers use to submit ops, inspect
session metadata, and shut the thread down.
* `LiveThread`: session-owned persistence lifecycle handle for one
active thread. Core session code uses it to append rollout items,
materialize lazy persistence, flush, shutdown, discard init-failed
writers, and load that thread’s persisted history.
* `ThreadStore`: storage backend abstraction. It answers “how are
threads persisted, read, listed, updated, archived?” Local and remote
implementations live behind this trait.
* `LocalThreadStore`: local ThreadStore implementation. It owns the
file/sqlite-specific details and keeps RolloutRecorder as a local
implementation detail.
This is a few too many Thread abstractions for my liking, but they do
all represent different concepts / needs / layers.
Migration note: in places where the core code explicitly requires a
path, rather than a thread ID, throw an error if we're running with a
remote store.
Cover the new local live-writer lifecycle with focused tests and
preserve app-server thread-start behavior, including ephemeral pathless
sessions.
