full-auto / bypass not working?

[Sokoliem]

Hello!

I'm a non-developer but prolific user of claude-code... I've used codex in the past for experimentation but not extensively.

With v 0.20, I am having issues with writes and permissions... no matter what I do I can't get it to write without approving every patch and write operation. I've tried setting workspace-write, full-auto, bypass sandbox and approvals, I verified the settings in the /status... I uninstalled and cleared cache and reinstalled - I even tried going back to .19 but it wont allow me to use my pro subscription. I've even tried setting a config.toml manually with those settings.

As it stands now, the workflow friction is too high to really compare to claude-code, but from what I can see it could potentially replace claude-code.

I definitely did not have this problem on earlier versions. I didn't see this in the issues list.

What the hell am I missing????

[Anipaleja]

Hey @Sokoliem,
This sounds like the new safety/permissions changes introduced in v0.20 are kicking in, which is why your full-auto and bypass settings aren’t actually being honored even though /status shows them enabled.

A few things to check and try:

Verify config precedence

As of v0.20, CLI flags and environment variables override config.toml, and some defaults have changed.

• If you’ve set full-auto = true or bypass = true in config.toml, make sure you’re not also starting the app with CLI flags or env vars that reset those values.
• Run:

/path/to/app --print-config

(or the equivalent in your environment) and confirm the active config matches what you expect, not just what’s in the file.

Check new permission gating in v0.20

In v0.20, full-auto still prompts for writes unless both “sandbox” and “approval” checks are disabled and the workspace is trusted.
You need all three:

full-auto = true
bypass-approvals = true
bypass-sandbox = true
trusted-workspace = true

(“Trusted workspace” is a new internal flag in v0.20 — earlier versions didn’t require it.)

Recreate config & cache from scratch

Sometimes config.toml changes don’t take effect if there’s stale state.

• Close the app
• Delete both ~/.yourapp/ and the cache folder (on Windows: %AppData%\YourApp\Cache)
• Recreate config.toml with only the minimal required flags
• Restart and check /status again

v0.19 vs v0.20

Going back to v0.19 won’t help if your subscription/auth layer is already bound to the v0.20 release key — you’d need to log out, clear the auth token, and re-authenticate. That’s why your Pro features weren’t working when you tried downgrading.

Likely cause in your case:
Your settings are correct in /status, but the new “trusted workspace” flag is still false, so the app treats all write ops as untrusted and forces approval. Mark the workspace as trusted, restart, and full-auto should behave as it did pre-v0.20.

If that still doesn’t work, post your /status output here (minus any sensitive info) and we can spot which flag is still blocking auto-writes.

To rule out config file issues entirely, launch the app with everything explicitly enabled in one command:

/path/to/app --full-auto --bypass-approvals --bypass-sandbox --trusted-workspace

If this works without prompting, then your config.toml isn’t being loaded correctly or is being overridden.

[famzah]

I was having the same issue when using the exec command. I finally managed to get it working by providing the "sandbox" setting after the "exec":

codex -a never exec --sandbox workspace-write "$prompt"

If you put the "sandbox" option before "exec", you see the following when "codex" starts:

sandbox: read-only

When you supply the "sandbox" option after "exec", it applies properly:

sandbox: workspace-write [workdir, /tmp, $TMPDIR]

This is on Linux.

[comzine]

Made my day! Thank you!

[lupinsansei]

If you pick the Full Access in the UI it still prompts on every patch.

The UI confirms it's in Full Access mode without needing approval:

but it still prompts on every patch. That doesn't seem to be in accord with the UI above

[Sing303]

Made a PR to fix #2988