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Codex Issues / #32682

Windows Store updates reset Codex taskbar-corner / tray visibility preference

Resolved 💬 3 comments Opened Jul 13, 2026 by CxMYu Closed Aug 6, 2026

Summary

After a Microsoft Store update, Codex's Windows taskbar-corner / system-tray visibility preference is treated as a new app and the icon can return to the overflow menu, even when the user previously chose to keep it visible.

Reproduction

  1. Install Codex Desktop from the Microsoft Store.
  2. In Windows taskbar settings, configure Codex to remain visible in the taskbar corner.
  3. Install a Codex update from the Microsoft Store.
  4. Launch the updated app.
  5. Observe that the tray icon may be placed back in the overflow menu and the preference must be set again.

Expected behavior

The user's taskbar-corner visibility choice should survive a normal Codex update.

Actual behavior

The update creates a new notification-area identity, so Windows does not reliably carry the previous visibility preference forward.

Evidence

The Microsoft Store install uses versioned MSIX package paths. Windows notification-area settings contain separate Codex records for distinct package versions, for example:

OpenAI.Codex_26.707.3748.0_x64__...\\app\\ChatGPT.exe
OpenAI.Codex_26.707.8168.0_x64__...\\app\\ChatGPT.exe

This strongly suggests that the tray identity presented to Windows changes across upgrades.

Suggested direction

Preserve a stable Windows tray identity across MSIX upgrades (for example, a stable AppUserModelID and/or tray icon GUID) so Windows can retain the user's existing notification-area preference.

Why this matters

This is a small but recurring update regression: users lose an explicit Windows preference after every app update. Fixing it proactively would avoid a common problem seen in comparable desktop coding apps.

View original on GitHub ↗

3 Comments

Kinasa0096 · 1 month ago

Additional confirmation from another affected installation:

  • Windows 10 Pro 22H2, build 19045.6466 (x64)
  • Codex Desktop 26.715.9079.0
  • Current executable path:

C:\Program Files\WindowsApps\OpenAI.Codex_26.715.9079.0_x64__2p2nqsd0c76g0\app\resources\codex.exe

  • The user reports that after each Codex update, an icon explicitly promoted out of the ^ overflow is hidden there again.

A concrete implementation path, if this tray is created through Electron, is to pass one hard-coded, version-independent UUID as the second argument to new Tray(image, guid) and keep it unchanged across releases. It should not be derived from the package version, package install path, or app version. Electron documents that for a signed Windows executable, this GUID is associated with the signature and OS-level settings such as tray position persist even when the executable path changes:
https://www.electronjs.org/docs/latest/api/tray/#new-trayimage-guid

This also matches the native Windows model: Microsoft recommends identifying a notification icon by guidItem rather than hWnd + uID:
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/api/shellapi/ns-shellapi-notifyiconidentifier#remarks

Suggested acceptance test:

  1. Install version N and promote Codex from overflow to the visible notification area.
  2. Upgrade through Microsoft Store/MSIX to version N+1.
  3. Launch Codex, restart Explorer (and ideally reboot once), and verify that the visibility/position remains unchanged.
  4. Cover both Windows 10 and Windows 11.

Existing users may need to promote the icon once after the stable GUID first ships; subsequent upgrades should then retain that preference.

mppanayotov · 1 month ago

Confirmed on Windows 11 23H2. After each Codex Microsoft Store update, the tray icon is placed back in the hidden-icons overflow even though it had previously been explicitly configured to remain visible. Manually promoting the icon fixes it only until the next Codex update.

This is repeatable across updates and appears consistent with the tray identity changing between versioned MSIX package installations. The visibility preference should survive normal application upgrades.

Kinasa0096 · 21 days ago

@CxMYu, could you please reopen this issue? It is still reproducible on the current Windows Store build.

Fresh confirmation from the same Windows 10 Pro 22H2 installation:

  • Previous package: OpenAI.Codex_26.727.6591.0_x64
  • Current package: OpenAI.Codex_26.730.8199.0_x64
  • The AppX deployment log records the update on 2026-08-05.
  • After the update, the Codex tray icon was again moved into the hidden-icons ^ overflow.
  • The user had to manually drag/promote the icon back to the visible notification area again.

There is no linked PR, commit, or released-fix reference in this issue, and the behavior persists on 26.730.8199.0. This appears to remain an active update regression rather than a completed or obsolete report.