Adds an optional `justification` parameter to the `prefix_rule()`
execpolicy DSL so policy authors can attach human-readable rationale to
a rule. That justification is propagated through parsing/matching and
can be surfaced to the model (or approval UI) when a command is blocked
or requires approval.
When a command is rejected (or gated behind approval) due to policy, a
generic message makes it hard for the model/user to understand what went
wrong and what to do instead. Allowing policy authors to supply a short
justification improves debuggability and helps guide the model toward
compliant alternatives.
Example:
```python
prefix_rule(
pattern = ["git", "push"],
decision = "forbidden",
justification = "pushing is blocked in this repo",
)
```
If Codex tried to run `git push origin main`, now the failure would
include:
```
`git push origin main` rejected: pushing is blocked in this repo
```
whereas previously, all it was told was:
```
execpolicy forbids this command
```
We decided that `*.rules` is a more fitting (and concise) file extension
than `*.codexpolicy`, so we are changing the file extension for the
"execpolicy" effort. We are also changing the subfolder of `$CODEX_HOME`
from `policy` to `rules` to match.
This PR updates the in-repo docs and we will update the public docs once
the next CLI release goes out.
Locally, I created `~/.codex/rules/default.rules` with the following
contents:
```
prefix_rule(pattern=["gh", "pr", "view"])
```
And then I asked Codex to run:
```
gh pr view 7888 --json title,body,comments
```
and it was able to!
## Refactor of the `execpolicy` crate
To illustrate why we need this refactor, consider an agent attempting to
run `apple | rm -rf ./`. Suppose `apple` is allowed by `execpolicy`.
Before this PR, `execpolicy` would consider `apple` and `pear` and only
render one rule match: `Allow`. We would skip any heuristics checks on
`rm -rf ./` and immediately approve `apple | rm -rf ./` to run.
To fix this, we now thread a `fallback` evaluation function into
`execpolicy` that runs when no `execpolicy` rules match a given command.
In our example, we would run `fallback` on `rm -rf ./` and prevent
`apple | rm -rf ./` from being run without approval.
this PR
- adds a helper function to amend `.codexpolicy` files with new prefix
rules
- adds a utility to `Policy` allowing prefix rules to be added to
existing `Policy` structs
both additions will be helpful as we thread codexpolicy into the TUI
workflow
adding execpolicycheck tool onto codex cli
this is useful for validating policies (can be multiple) against
commands.
it will also surface errors in policy syntax:
<img width="1150" height="281" alt="Screenshot 2025-11-19 at 12 46
21 PM"
src="https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/8f99b403-564c-4172-acc9-6574a8d13dc3"
/>
this PR also changes output format when there's no match in the CLI.
instead of returning the raw string `noMatch`, we return
`{"noMatch":{}}`
this PR is a rewrite of: https://github.com/openai/codex/pull/6932 (due
to the numerous merge conflicts present in the original PR)
---------
Co-authored-by: Michael Bolin <mbolin@openai.com>
Michael Bolin ·
zhao-oai ·