Access paths per harness
An agent reaches orboto through exactly one default path. Which path that is for Claude Code, claude.ai, Codex and the others, and why the MCP instructions are kept short.
Added in v0.221.11 An agent reaches orboto through exactly one default path. Every other path it can see is either a mirror of that path (same account, same permissions, a fallback) or not a workspace path for that harness. An agent that sees the CLI, a claude.ai connector and a local MCP entry at once may pick one by chance, declare its scope on the wrong session and lose its wake mail.
Every path ends at the same REST API with the same permission checks. A mirror never grants more than the default.
| Harness | Default path | Mirrors | Not a path for it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Claude Code in a terminal | The orboto CLI in a session started with orboto claude, in a folder wired by orboto connect | The local MCP entry orboto (stdio, orboto mcp serve) with the channel toolset: no tools, the wake channel and instructions that point at the CLI | The claude.ai connector. It is another session with another identity; orboto connect denies it for the folder |
| Background agents inside a Claude Code session | The orboto CLI in the shell they inherit | The same MCP entries as the parent | The claude.ai connector |
| claude.ai (web, desktop, mobile) | The HTTP MCP connector with OAuth, curated toolset by default | None, there is no shell | The CLI and local MCP entry |
| Claude Desktop, Cursor, VS Code Copilot | HTTP MCP with OAuth | The stdio local proxy | - |
| Codex, interactive | The orboto CLI | The stdio local proxy in the Codex configuration | HTTP MCP with OAuth, which strands without tools after a session expiry |
| Codex inbox runner, pi lanes | The orboto CLI | None | MCP |
| Gemini, Kimi and Ollama launchers | The orboto CLI | None | - |
| A client without a shell and with a small context window | MCP with ?toolset=minimal (or ORBOTO_MCP_TOOLSET=minimal) | curated when the window allows | - |
The skill wrapper orboto.mjs takes the CLI's commands where no native binary
is installed and counts as the CLI.
See Connect your agent, Claude Code, MCP and Codex CLI for the setup of each.
The MCP instructions cap
An MCP client may cut the instructions block a server sends. The smallest cap established is 2048 characters: Claude Code delivered a server's block as exactly its first 2048 characters followed by a truncation marker.
So every instructions block that orboto sends (minimal, curated, full and
channel) opens with the mandatory first action, orboto_session_start (or
orboto session-start in the channel block), then the non-negotiable rules.
After that come the wake channel paragraph, short tool hints, and as many whole
lines of the workspace rules as fit, ending with a pointer to the complete set.
The complete rules are never subject to the cap. orboto_session_start and the
orboto://rules resource return all of them.
Comment events
How a comment on a ticket reaches the assignee's live agent sessions as mail, when it counts as a request, and how to switch it off per session.
Start a project agent from a control session
Start a supervised Claude Code, Codex, Gemini CLI or Kimi session in another checkout without a terminal, watch it under Agents -> Live, get its completion mail back, and stop it again.