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Codex Issues / #39739

macOS Remote Control: enable/client list succeed but pairing never starts; UI shows “Unable to update remote control status”

Open 💬 3 comments Opened Aug 20, 2026 by 8659yn5xb9-hash
💡 Likely answer: A maintainer (github-actions[bot], contributor) responded on this thread — see the highlighted reply below.

Summary

On macOS, Remote Control cannot be enabled from Settings. The UI shows “Unable to update remote control status”. The backend calls to enable Remote Control and list clients succeed, but the flow never proceeds to pairing / QR-code generation.

Environment

  • macOS
  • Codex/ChatGPT desktop app version: 26.818.21641
  • Personal ChatGPT account
  • MFA enabled
  • Only one desktop instance/process observed

Latest reproduction

At Beijing time 2026-08-21 00:37:20–00:38:00:

  • 00:37:23.286 — remoteControl/enable succeeded in 2 ms, errorCode=null
  • 00:37:28.487 — remoteControl/client/list succeeded in 1051 ms, errorCode=null
  • No Pairing / pairing-code request was logged
  • No Workspace-related error in this reproduction window
  • No 401/403/409 in this reproduction window
  • No warning/error entries related to Remote Control

The UI still reports “Unable to update remote control status” and no QR / pairing code appears.

Earlier observations

  • Earlier sessions had HTTP 403 Forbidden: Multi-factor authentication required; MFA has since been enabled and that error no longer appears in the latest reproduction.
  • One earlier session returned 401: Must use workspace account for this operation, but this did not recur in the latest reproduction.
  • App Server startup, handshake, and connection are normal; no restart loop, conflict, or 409 was observed.
  • In an earlier attempt, a transient UI message mentioned ensuring only one instance was running, but no duplicate process was found.

Expected behavior

After enabling Remote Control in Settings, the desktop app should proceed to pairing and display a QR / pairing code.

Actual behavior

remoteControl/enable and remoteControl/client/list succeed, but the app never emits a pairing request and the UI shows “Unable to update remote control status.”

The flow appears to stop between successful Remote Control enablement/client-list retrieval and the pairing stage.

View original on GitHub ↗

3 Comments

github-actions[bot] contributor · 7 days ago

Potential duplicates detected. Please review them and close your issue if it is a duplicate.

  • #38534

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8659yn5xb9-hash · 6 days ago

I reviewed #38534 and #37698. My case appears different: MFA is enabled, only one instance is running, remoteControl/enable and remoteControl/client/list succeed, but no remoteControl/pairing/start request is emitted. I’ll keep this issue open unless maintainers confirm it is a duplicate.

发自我的iPhone

------------------ Original ------------------
From: github-actions[bot] @.*>
Date: Fri,Aug 21,2026 0:49 AM
To: openai/codex @.*>
Cc: 8659yn5xb9-hash @.>, Author @.>
Subject: Re: [openai/codex] macOS Remote Control: enable/client list succeed but pairing never starts; UI shows “Unable to update remote control status” (Issue #39739)

github-actions[bot] left a comment (openai/codex#39739)

Potential duplicates detected. Please review them and close your issue if it is a duplicate.

#38534

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Alex-Griffith · 2 days ago

Adding a clean single-instance reproduction on a newer macOS Desktop build.

Environment

  • ChatGPT / Codex Desktop for macOS: 26.818.61809 (build 7019)
  • Desktop App only; Codex CLI is not separately installed
  • Reproduced: 2026-08-25

Clean reproduction

  1. Finished all active Codex tasks and fully quit the Desktop App.
  2. Confirmed that the single main ChatGPT process and all session-owned codex app-server --listen stdio:// processes had exited; no remote-control process remained.
  3. Terminated stale crashpad handlers, then restarted the Desktop App as the only instance.
  4. Opened Settings > Connections > Control this Mac > Allow connections.

The same failure occurred immediately: “Unable to update remote state”, followed by “Please ensure only one instance of ChatGPT is running.” Process inspection confirmed that there was only one Desktop instance.

The minimal relevant current-session trace is:

remoteControl/enable       errorCode=null

refresh_remote_control_started
refresh_remote_control_completed
    previousConnectionCount=0
    nextConnectionCount=0
    autoConnectConnectionCount=0

remoteControl/client/list  errorCode=null
remoteControl/client/list  errorCode=null

No remoteControl/pairing/start event was observed. The UI never transitioned to pairing/availability.

An older pre-restart Desktop session also repeatedly showed:

remoteControl/client/list  errorCode=-32600
HTTP 404 Not Found
{"detail":"Remote environment not found"}

Calls to remoteControl/enable around that time still returned errorCode=null. After the clean restart, the 404 no longer appears, but the UI failure remains. The Desktop context also reports saved/discovered connections while refresh_remote_control_completed remains at nextConnectionCount=0.

This corroborates the failure boundary reported here and suggests that stale/invalid Remote Environment recovery or Desktop state reconciliation may be involved. The “only one instance” message appears misleading for this reproduction.