Addresses #22833, #22245, #23067
## Why
`/goal` can keep synthesizing turns even when the next turn cannot make
meaningful progress. Hard usage exhaustion can replay failing turns, and
repeated permission or external-resource blockers can keep burning
tokens while waiting for user or system intervention.
## What changed
- Add resumable `blocked` and `usageLimited` goal states. As with
`paused`, goal continuation stops with these states.
- Move to `usageLimited` after usage-limit failures.
- Allow the built-in `update_goal` tool to set `blocked` only under
explicit repeated-impasse guidance. Updated goal continuation prompt to
specify that agent should use `blocked` only when it has made at least
three attempts to get past an impasse.
Most of the files touched by this PR are because of the small app server
protocol update.
## Validation
I manually reproduced a number of situations where an agent can run into
a true impasse and verified that it properly enters `blocked` state. I
then resumed and verified that it once again entered `blocked` state
several turns later if the impasse still exists.
I also manually reproduced the usage-limit condition by creating a
simulated responses API endpoint that returns 429 errors with the
appropriate error message. Verified that the goal runtime properly moves
the goal into `usageLimited` state and TUI UI updates appropriately.
Verified that `/goal resume` resumes (and immediately goes back into
`ussageLImited` state if appropriate).
## Follow-up PRs
Small changes will be needed to the GUI clients to properly handle the
two new states.
## Why
Users have requested the ability to edit a goal's objective after a goal
has been created. This PR exposes a new `/goal edit` command in the TUI
to address this request.
In the process of implementing this, I also noticed an existing bug in
the goal runtime. When a goal's objective is updated through the
`thread/goal/set` app server API, the goal runtime didn't emit a new
steering prompt to tell the agent about the new objective. This PR also
fixes this hole.
## What Changed
- Adds `/goal edit` in the TUI, opening an edit box prefilled with the
current goal objective.
- Keeps active and paused goals in their current state, resets completed
goals to active, keeps budget-limited goals budget-limited, and
preserves the existing token budget.
- Changes the existing `thread/goal/set` behavior so editing an
objective preserves goal accounting instead of resetting it. The older
reset-on-new-objective behavior was left over from before
`thread/goal/clear`; clients that need to reset accounting can now clear
the existing goal and create a new one.
- Reuses the existing goal set API path; this does not add or change
app-server protocol surface area.
- Adds a dedicated goal runtime steering prompt when an externally
persisted goal mutation changes the objective, so active turns receive
the updated objective.
## Validation
- Make sure `/goal edit` returns an error if no goal currently exists
- Make sure `/goal edit` displays an edit box that can be optionally
canceled with no side effects
- Make sure that an edited goal results in a steer so the agent starts
pursuing the new objective
- Make sure the new objective is reflected in the goal if you use
`/goal` to display the goal summary
- Make sure that `/goal edit` doesn't reset the token budget, time/token
accounting on the updated goal
## Summary
This PR updates the goal continuation prompt to address feedback from
early adopters. There are two primary changes:
1. Goal continuation and budget-limit steering prompts now use hidden
user-context messages instead of hidden developer messages.
2. The goal continuation prompt is refined to improve the model's
ability to fully complete the active goal rather than stop at a smaller
or merely passing subset.
The user-message transition is important for two reasons. First, it
eliminates an issue where older steering messages could be responded to
again after a new turn. Second, it works better with compaction because
user messages are treated differently from developer messages during
compaction.
The prompt refinements make persistence explicit, ground work in current
evidence, encourage `update_plan` for multi-step progress visibility,
and require stronger completion audits before calling `update_goal`. It
also removes the elapsed-time reporting in the prompt; I saw evidence
that this was causing the model to shortcut work as it became nervous
about time.
These changes were tested with evals. Chriss4123 has also been running
independent evals in
[#19910](https://github.com/openai/codex/issues/19910), and many of the
improvements in this PR were suggested by him.
## Verification
- Tested with evals.
- Added and updated focused `codex-core` coverage for hidden goal user
context, continuation and budget-limit request shape, prompt rendering,
and objective delimiter escaping.
## Why
`/goal` is supposed to keep Codex working until the goal is actually
done. The previous continuation logic had two ways to stop early: the
continuation prompt told the model to wait for new input when it felt
blocked, and the runtime suppressed another continuation turn after a
continuation finished without any tool calls.
That made goals stop short even when the agent could still keep making
progress (I received a few reports of this from users). It also relied
on a brittle heuristic that treated "no registry tool calls" as
equivalent to "should stop."
## What changed
- removed the continuation prompt sentence that told the model to stop
and wait for new input when it could not continue productively
- removed the goal runtime suppression heuristic that stopped
auto-continuation after a no-tool continuation turn
- deleted the continuation-activity bookkeeping and left `tool_calls` as
telemetry only
- added focused regressions for the two intended behaviors: completed
no-tool continuation turns still continue, while `request_user_input`
keeps the existing turn open instead of spawning a new continuation
Adds the core runtime behavior for active goals on top of the model
tools from PR 3.
## Why
A long-running goal should be a core runtime concern, not something
every client has to implement. Core owns the turn lifecycle, tool
completion boundaries, interruptions, resume behavior, and token usage,
so it is the right place to account progress, enforce budgets, and
decide when to continue work.
## What changed
- Centralized goal lifecycle side effects behind
`Session::goal_runtime_apply(GoalRuntimeEvent::...)`.
- Starts goal continuation turns only when the session is idle; pending
user input and mailbox work take priority.
- Accounts token and wall-clock usage at turn, tool, mutation,
interrupt, and resume boundaries; `get_thread_goal` remains read-only.
- Preserves sub-second wall-clock remainder across accounting boundaries
so long-running goals do not drift downward over time.
- Treats token budget exhaustion as a soft stop by marking the goal
`budget_limited` and injecting wrap-up steering instead of aborting the
active turn.
- Suppresses budget steering when `update_goal` marks a goal complete.
- Pauses active goals on interrupt and auto-reactivates paused goals
when a thread resumes outside plan mode.
- Suppresses repeated automatic continuation when a continuation turn
makes no tool calls.
- Added continuation and budget-limit prompt templates.
## Verification
- Added focused core coverage for continuation scheduling, accounting
boundaries, budget-limit steering, completion accounting, interrupt
pause behavior, resume auto-activation, and wall-clock remainder
accounting.
Eric Traut ·