codex-delegate

What this does

Spawns the codex-delegate subagent (low-effort Sonnet), which runs codex exec with output redirected to a log and returns only a ~10-line summary. Routing lives in ~/.claude/CLAUDE.md § Codex Delegation; wrapper mechanics live in the agent definition. This file covers only the orchestrator side: how to spawn and what to do with the result.

How to invoke

1. Turn the request ($ARGUMENTS if given, else the current task) into a self-contained spec — Codex has no memory of this conversation, so include everything: exact behavior, file paths, edge cases, and how to verify.

2. Spawn the subagent (background), passing TASK, WORKDIR (default: current working directory), SANDBOX (workspace-write for edits, read-only for investigation), and a VERIFY command if there's a test/build to check.

   Preferred — the dedicated agent (available after a Claude Code restart that registers .claude/agents/codex-delegate.md):

   Agent(
     subagent_type: "codex-delegate",
     description: "delegate to codex",
     prompt: "TASK: <full self-contained spec>\nWORKDIR: <abs path>\nSANDBOX: workspace-write\nVERIFY: <test/build cmd or omit>\nTAKEOVER: allowed  # optional — lets the wrapper finish mechanical remainder itself if Codex is quota-blocked/crashed; omit to restrict it to salvage-only",
     run_in_background: true
   )
   

   Fallback — if that errors with Agent type 'codex-delegate' not found (the definition isn't loaded in this session yet), spawn a generic Sonnet subagent that reads the same playbook file:

   Agent(
     subagent_type: "general-purpose",
     model: "sonnet",
     effort: "low",
     description: "delegate to codex",
     prompt: "First Read /home/cong/.claude/agents/codex-delegate.md and adopt it as your complete role and instructions. Then carry out:\nTASK: <full self-contained spec>\nWORKDIR: <abs path>\nSANDBOX: workspace-write\nVERIFY: <test/build cmd or omit>",
     run_in_background: true
   )
   

3. When it returns its compact summary, review the actual change yourself before accepting: run git diff / git status, sanity-check the files it reports, and re-run VERIFY if correctness matters. Codex is fast but not infallible — you own the merge.

Long tasks, status checks, failures

• A background wrapper sometimes ends its turn early ("waiting for notification") on multi-notification runs. If a long task has gone quiet, SendMessage the same agent id asking for a concrete status — don't spawn a fresh wrapper (it would re-derive everything cold). Same for follow-up work that needs the task's context.
• The wrapper may return BLOCKED — quota resets at <time> (Codex usage limit). That's not a failure to retry — reschedule the same delegation after the reset, or do the work another way.
• Codex quota is a shared budget: batch related work into one delegation instead of many small ones, and don't redo a delegation for cosmetic reasons.

Safety notes

• workspace-write lets Codex edit any file under WORKDIR, including things like .env or config/DB files. For a sensitive repo, pass a narrower WORKDIR (a subdir) or read-only.
• Never run two workspace-write delegations against the same WORKDIR concurrently, and do not edit that checkout from the main context while a write delegation is running. Parallel read-only delegations are safe. If parallel writers are explicitly needed, create a separate Git worktree for each task and pass its path as WORKDIR.
• The subagent invokes Codex only via ~/.claude/scripts/codex-run.sh, which accepts no flag pass-through — approval-bypass flags are structurally impossible, and quota/stall detection is built in. Don't bypass the script.
• This needs the codex CLI installed and authenticated (codex login). If missing, codex:setup-style checks: codex --version.