Could you please re-enable web search for 5.6 family of models?

Reproduce the issue with Codex CLI 0.146.0 using the API subscription and gpt-5.6-sol, then trace the web_search capability handling for the 5.6 model family. Done means those models can use the server-side web_search tool instead of requiring curl.

What version of Codex CLI is running?

0.146.0

What subscription do you have?

API

Which model were you using?

gpt-5.6-sol

What platform is your computer?

Linux 5.14.0-687.17.1.el9_8.x86_64 x86_64 x86_64

What terminal emulator and version are you using (if applicable)?

xterm

Codex doctor report

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}

What issue are you seeing?

5.6 family of models are unable to use server-side web_search tools (only curl calls are available) which seems like a huge downgrade to me

What steps can reproduce the bug?

just ask the model what tools are avalable.

1. gpt-5.5:

› what tools are available for you in this session?
• Available tools in this session:
  - web.run in analysis: web search/open pages, image search, weather, finance,
    sports, time, calculator.

› can you search the web without calling `curl` on local machine?
• Yes.
  I have a separate web.run tool for web access. It performs web search, opens
  pages, and can fetch specialized data like weather/finance/sports/time without
  running curl or any other command on the local machine.
  Local shell network access is restricted anyway; when I need web information,
  I use web.run, not local commands.

also, "tools" section of model prompt contains

    {
      "type": "web_search",
      "external_web_access": true,
      "search_content_types": [
        "text",
        "image"
      ]
    }

2. after switching to gpt-5.6-sol

› what tools are available for you in this session?

• Available tools in this session:

  - Shell command execution in a restricted, workspace-write sandbox
  - File editing via patches
  - Local image inspection
  - Long-running process interaction and waiting
  - Task-plan tracking
  - Goal creation/status tracking when explicitly requested
  - Multi-agent collaboration tools, but only when explicitly requested by you
    or project instructions

  - User-input prompts in Plan mode only

  Available specialized skills:

  - Image generation/editing
  - OpenAI documentation lookup
  - Codex plugin creation
  - Codex skill creation
  - Codex skill installation

  Network access is restricted, and actions outside the sandbox may require your
  approval.
› can you search the web without calling `curl` on local machine?

• Not with the tools currently enabled. There’s no general web-search/browser
  tool in this session.

  I can use official OpenAI documentation tools for OpenAI-related questions.
  Otherwise, internet access would require a local command such as curl, subject
  to network restrictions and approval.

and it is true -- it is unable to search web

What is the expected behavior?

I expect it to be able to perform web search if it is enabled in (managed) config, using server-side web_search with Responses API, like all the models before 5.6 did. My machine is in isolated environment, so direct curl calls are not avaialble.

Additional information

No response