[iOS Remote] Host connects and lists tasks, but messages fail to load and new local tasks fail (1.2026.237)

What version of the Codex App are you using (From “About Codex” dialog)?

• ChatGPT desktop: 26.901.51231, build 8109 (installed bundle metadata).
• Bundled Codex: 0.153.4.
• iOS Remote client: 1.2026.237, recorded as codex_chatgpt_ios_remote in host request logs.

What subscription do you have?

Not collected during this audit.

What platform is your computer?

macOS 26.3.1, build 25D2128. The client displaying the failure is ChatGPT on iOS; the iOS operating-system version was not collected.

What issue are you seeing?

ChatGPT iOS Remote can see and connect to the Mac and display its existing task list. Selecting a task opens its title, host/project row, composer, and change summary, but the message area displays:

Error loading messages.

A Retry button is present. Starting new local tasks from iOS also fails from the user's perspective.

The failure was reproduced on the active desktop conversation used to investigate this issue. Its transcript exists locally, so missing history files cannot explain that reproduction. The screenshot shows the error at approximately 13:57 EDT / 17:57 UTC on September 7, 2026.

What steps can reproduce the bug?

1. Open Remote in ChatGPT on iOS and connect to the Mac running the desktop app.
2. Confirm the task list is visible.
3. Select an existing local task. In the correlated reproduction, this was an active task created in the desktop app.
4. Observe that task metadata and the composer are visible but messages fail to load.
5. Attempt to start a new local task from iOS. The user also observes failure here; host logs show that these attempts reach thread initialization, as detailed below.

What is the expected behavior?

Existing task messages should load and new local tasks should start successfully through iOS Remote.

Additional information

Existing-task reproduction reaches the host

At 17:57:25 UTC, app-server connection 44 initializes and sends thread/list requests. At 17:57:28, the same connection sends thread/resume for the exact task shown in the screenshot. Host request context identifies:

app_server.client_name="codex_chatgpt_ios_remote"
app_server.client_version="1.2026.237"
app_server.connection_id=44
rpc.method="thread/resume"

The task is loaded locally. Its transcript exists and measured 1,212,878 bytes when checked at approximately 17:58:49 UTC. Its state row has history_mode="paginated" and archived=0. The history mode is a diagnostic detail, not an established cause.

The resume path logs:

thread/resume overrides ignored for loaded thread:
config overrides were provided and ignored while running

This warning is included as context only. It does not prove resume failed. The inspected logs do not show the final response payload or a mobile decoding error, so response delivery/handling versus another failure has not been isolated.

New-task attempts also reach initialization

Five earlier thread/start requests from the same iOS client version reached the Mac at 14:41:23, 14:41:45, 14:42:10, 14:42:48, and 14:43:11 UTC. Each progressed through:

app_server.thread_start.create_thread
thread_spawn
session_init
Shell snapshot successfully created

This establishes that the requests reached host initialization, not that response delivery or task persistence completed.

Their five task IDs match tasks that later produced 34 desktop-side missing-rollout failures from 17:42:47.556 to 17:43:14.048 UTC: 29 thread/resume failures and five thread/archive failures. Errors include:

code=-32600
failureReason=rollout_not_found
failed to resolve rollout path ...: file does not exist
thread not loaded

The five transcript filenames were absent from both active and archived session directories when checked. Their IDs also had no current rows in state_5.sqlite; archive attempts occurred before this database check. The logs do not establish whether those histories were never persisted, removed, or referenced incorrectly. These missing-file errors do not explain the later failure on the existing active transcript.

A separate desktop thread/start succeeded at 17:43:20.089 UTC, with errorCode=null and a duration of 90 ms.

Related reports

• #43488 uses the same desktop build but iOS 1.2026.230 and reports completed-task failures while newly created tasks open. This reproduction uses iOS 1.2026.237, includes an active desktop-created task, and also includes failed new-task attempts that reach host initialization.
• #38889 reports failures for CLI-origin paginated tasks. The correlated existing-task reproduction here was desktop-created.
• #42129 reports failures associated with large individual records. No record-size threshold has been established here.

Private task/request IDs, host/project names, local usernames, and conversation contents are omitted. The screenshot is represented by its exact error text because it contains private metadata. No raw transcripts or private session uploads are included. Root cause remains unconfirmed.

Start with the app-server thread/resume and thread/start entry points, correlating their host logs with transcript persistence in the active and archived session directories and state_5.sqlite. Trace response delivery and handling for the iOS Remote client; done means existing messages load and new local tasks start successfully.