feat: agent controller (#8783)

Added an agent control plane that lets sessions spawn or message other
conversations via `AgentControl`.

`AgentBus` (core/src/agent/bus.rs) keeps track of the last known status
of a conversation.

ConversationManager now holds shared state behind an Arc so AgentControl
keeps only a weak back-reference, the goal is just to avoid explicit
cycle reference.

Follow-ups:
* Build a small tool in the TUI to be able to see every agent and send
manual message to each of them
* Handle approval requests in this TUI
* Add tools to spawn/communicate between agents (see related design)
* Define agent types

Author: jif-oai

codex-rs/core/src/agent/bus.rs

@@ -0,0 +1,61 @@
+use codex_protocol::ConversationId;
+use codex_protocol::protocol::EventMsg;
+use std::collections::HashMap;
+use std::sync::Arc;
+use tokio::sync::RwLock;
+
+/// Status store for globally-tracked agents.
+#[derive(Clone, Default)]
+pub(crate) struct AgentBus {
+    /// In-memory map of conversation id to the latest derived status.
+    statuses: Arc<RwLock<HashMap<ConversationId, AgentStatus>>>,
+}
+
+#[derive(Clone, Debug, PartialEq, Eq)]
+pub(crate) enum AgentStatus {
+    PendingInit,
+    Running,
+    Completed(Option<String>),
+    Errored(String),
+    Shutdown,
+    #[allow(dead_code)] // Used by upcoming multi-agent tooling.
+    NotFound,
+}
+
+impl AgentBus {
+    /// Fetch the last known status for `agent_id`, returning `NotFound` if unseen.
+    #[allow(dead_code)] // Used by upcoming multi-agent tooling.
+    pub(crate) async fn status(&self, agent_id: ConversationId) -> AgentStatus {
+        let statuses = self.statuses.read().await;
+        statuses
+            .get(&agent_id)
+            .cloned()
+            .unwrap_or(AgentStatus::NotFound)
+    }
+
+    /// Derive and record agent status from a single emitted event.
+    pub(crate) async fn on_event(&self, conversation_id: ConversationId, msg: &EventMsg) {
+        let next_status = match msg {
+            EventMsg::TaskStarted(_) => Some(AgentStatus::Running),
+            EventMsg::TaskComplete(ev) => {
+                Some(AgentStatus::Completed(ev.last_agent_message.clone()))
+            }
+            EventMsg::TurnAborted(ev) => Some(AgentStatus::Errored(format!("{:?}", ev.reason))),
+            EventMsg::Error(ev) => Some(AgentStatus::Errored(ev.message.clone())),
+            EventMsg::ShutdownComplete => Some(AgentStatus::Shutdown),
+            _ => None,
+        };
+        if let Some(status) = next_status {
+            self.record_status(&conversation_id, status).await;
+        }
+    }
+
+    /// Force-set the tracked status for an agent conversation.
+    pub(crate) async fn record_status(
+        &self,
+        conversation_id: &ConversationId,
+        status: AgentStatus,
+    ) {
+        self.statuses.write().await.insert(*conversation_id, status);
+    }
+}

codex-rs/core/src/agent/control.rs

@@ -0,0 +1,254 @@
+use crate::CodexConversation;
+use crate::agent::AgentBus;
+use crate::agent::AgentStatus;
+use crate::conversation_manager::ConversationManagerState;
+use crate::error::CodexErr;
+use crate::error::Result as CodexResult;
+use codex_protocol::ConversationId;
+use codex_protocol::protocol::EventMsg;
+use codex_protocol::protocol::Op;
+use codex_protocol::user_input::UserInput;
+use std::sync::Arc;
+use std::sync::Weak;
+
+/// Control-plane handle for multi-agent operations.
+/// `AgentControl` is held by each session (via `SessionServices`). It provides capability to
+/// spawn new agents and the inter-agent communication layer.
+#[derive(Clone, Default)]
+pub(crate) struct AgentControl {
+    /// Weak handle back to the global conversation registry/state.
+    /// This is `Weak` to avoid reference cycles and shadow persistence of the form
+    /// `ConversationManagerState -> CodexConversation -> Session -> SessionServices -> ConversationManagerState`.
+    manager: Weak<ConversationManagerState>,
+    /// Shared agent status store updated from emitted events.
+    pub(crate) bus: AgentBus,
+}
+
+impl AgentControl {
+    /// Construct a new `AgentControl` that can spawn/message agents via the given manager state.
+    pub(crate) fn new(manager: Weak<ConversationManagerState>, bus: AgentBus) -> Self {
+        Self { manager, bus }
+    }
+
+    #[allow(dead_code)] // Used by upcoming multi-agent tooling.
+    /// Spawn a new agent conversation and submit the initial prompt.
+    ///
+    /// If `headless` is true, a background drain task is spawned to prevent unbounded event growth
+    /// of the channel queue when there is no client actively reading the conversation events.
+    pub(crate) async fn spawn_agent(
+        &self,
+        config: crate::config::Config,
+        prompt: String,
+        headless: bool,
+    ) -> CodexResult<ConversationId> {
+        let state = self.upgrade()?;
+        let new_conversation = state.spawn_new_conversation(config, self.clone()).await?;
+
+        self.bus
+            .record_status(&new_conversation.conversation_id, AgentStatus::PendingInit)
+            .await;
+
+        if headless {
+            spawn_headless_drain(
+                Arc::clone(&new_conversation.conversation),
+                new_conversation.conversation_id,
+                self.clone(),
+            );
+        }
+
+        self.send_prompt(new_conversation.conversation_id, prompt)
+            .await?;
+
+        self.bus
+            .record_status(&new_conversation.conversation_id, AgentStatus::Running)
+            .await;
+
+        Ok(new_conversation.conversation_id)
+    }
+
+    #[allow(dead_code)] // Used by upcoming multi-agent tooling.
+    /// Send a `user` prompt to an existing agent conversation.
+    pub(crate) async fn send_prompt(
+        &self,
+        agent_id: ConversationId,
+        prompt: String,
+    ) -> CodexResult<String> {
+        let state = self.upgrade()?;
+        state
+            .send_op(
+                agent_id,
+                Op::UserInput {
+                    items: vec![UserInput::Text { text: prompt }],
+                    final_output_json_schema: None,
+                },
+            )
+            .await
+    }
+
+    fn upgrade(&self) -> CodexResult<Arc<ConversationManagerState>> {
+        self.manager.upgrade().ok_or_else(|| {
+            CodexErr::UnsupportedOperation("conversation manager dropped".to_string())
+        })
+    }
+}
+
+/// When an agent is spawned "headless" (no UI/view attached), there may be no consumer polling
+/// `CodexConversation::next_event()`. The underlying event channel is unbounded, so the producer can
+/// accumulate events indefinitely. This drain task prevents that memory growth by polling and
+/// discarding events until shutdown.
+fn spawn_headless_drain(
+    conversation: Arc<CodexConversation>,
+    conversation_id: ConversationId,
+    agent_control: AgentControl,
+) {
+    tokio::spawn(async move {
+        loop {
+            match conversation.next_event().await {
+                Ok(event) => {
+                    if matches!(event.msg, EventMsg::ShutdownComplete) {
+                        break;
+                    }
+                }
+                Err(err) => {
+                    agent_control
+                        .bus
+                        .record_status(&conversation_id, AgentStatus::Errored(err.to_string()))
+                        .await;
+                    break;
+                }
+            }
+        }
+    });
+}
+
+#[cfg(test)]
+mod tests {
+    use super::*;
+    use codex_protocol::protocol::ErrorEvent;
+    use codex_protocol::protocol::TaskCompleteEvent;
+    use codex_protocol::protocol::TaskStartedEvent;
+    use codex_protocol::protocol::TurnAbortReason;
+    use codex_protocol::protocol::TurnAbortedEvent;
+    use pretty_assertions::assert_eq;
+
+    #[tokio::test]
+    async fn send_prompt_errors_when_manager_dropped() {
+        let control = AgentControl::default();
+        let err = control
+            .send_prompt(ConversationId::new(), "hello".to_string())
+            .await
+            .expect_err("send_prompt should fail without a manager");
+        assert_eq!(
+            err.to_string(),
+            "unsupported operation: conversation manager dropped"
+        );
+    }
+
+    #[tokio::test]
+    async fn record_status_persists_to_bus() {
+        let control = AgentControl::default();
+        let conversation_id = ConversationId::new();
+
+        control
+            .bus
+            .record_status(&conversation_id, AgentStatus::PendingInit)
+            .await;
+
+        let got = control.bus.status(conversation_id).await;
+        assert_eq!(got, AgentStatus::PendingInit);
+    }
+
+    #[tokio::test]
+    async fn on_event_updates_status_from_task_started() {
+        let control = AgentControl::default();
+        let conversation_id = ConversationId::new();
+
+        control
+            .bus
+            .on_event(
+                conversation_id,
+                &EventMsg::TaskStarted(TaskStartedEvent {
+                    model_context_window: None,
+                }),
+            )
+            .await;
+
+        let got = control.bus.status(conversation_id).await;
+        assert_eq!(got, AgentStatus::Running);
+    }
+
+    #[tokio::test]
+    async fn on_event_updates_status_from_task_complete() {
+        let control = AgentControl::default();
+        let conversation_id = ConversationId::new();
+
+        control
+            .bus
+            .on_event(
+                conversation_id,
+                &EventMsg::TaskComplete(TaskCompleteEvent {
+                    last_agent_message: Some("done".to_string()),
+                }),
+            )
+            .await;
+
+        let expected = AgentStatus::Completed(Some("done".to_string()));
+        let got = control.bus.status(conversation_id).await;
+        assert_eq!(got, expected);
+    }
+
+    #[tokio::test]
+    async fn on_event_updates_status_from_error() {
+        let control = AgentControl::default();
+        let conversation_id = ConversationId::new();
+
+        control
+            .bus
+            .on_event(
+                conversation_id,
+                &EventMsg::Error(ErrorEvent {
+                    message: "boom".to_string(),
+                    codex_error_info: None,
+                }),
+            )
+            .await;
+
+        let expected = AgentStatus::Errored("boom".to_string());
+        let got = control.bus.status(conversation_id).await;
+        assert_eq!(got, expected);
+    }
+
+    #[tokio::test]
+    async fn on_event_updates_status_from_turn_aborted() {
+        let control = AgentControl::default();
+        let conversation_id = ConversationId::new();
+
+        control
+            .bus
+            .on_event(
+                conversation_id,
+                &EventMsg::TurnAborted(TurnAbortedEvent {
+                    reason: TurnAbortReason::Interrupted,
+                }),
+            )
+            .await;
+
+        let expected = AgentStatus::Errored("Interrupted".to_string());
+        let got = control.bus.status(conversation_id).await;
+        assert_eq!(got, expected);
+    }
+
+    #[tokio::test]
+    async fn on_event_updates_status_from_shutdown_complete() {
+        let control = AgentControl::default();
+        let conversation_id = ConversationId::new();
+
+        control
+            .bus
+            .on_event(conversation_id, &EventMsg::ShutdownComplete)
+            .await;
+
+        let got = control.bus.status(conversation_id).await;
+        assert_eq!(got, AgentStatus::Shutdown);
+    }
+}

codex-rs/core/src/agent/mod.rs

@@ -0,0 +1,6 @@
+pub(crate) mod bus;
+pub(crate) mod control;
+
+pub(crate) use bus::AgentBus;
+pub(crate) use bus::AgentStatus;
+pub(crate) use control::AgentControl;