Cancel

Cancel Skill

Intelligent cancellation that detects and cancels the active OMX mode.

The cancel skill is the standard way to complete and exit any OMX mode. When the stop hook detects work is complete, it instructs the LLM to invoke this skill for proper state cleanup. If cancel fails or is interrupted, retry with --force flag, or wait for the 2-hour staleness timeout as a last resort.

What It Does

Automatically detects which mode is active and cancels it:

• Autopilot: Stops workflow, preserves progress for resume
• Ralph: Stops persistence loop, clears linked ultrawork if applicable
• Ultrawork: Stops parallel execution (standalone or linked)
• Ecomode: Stops token-efficient parallel execution (standalone or linked to ralph)
• UltraQA: Stops QA cycling workflow
• Swarm: Stops coordinated agent swarm, releases claimed tasks
• Ultrapilot: Stops parallel autopilot workers
• Pipeline: Stops sequential agent pipeline
• Team: Sends shutdown inbox to all workers, waits for exit, kills tmux session, and clears team state

Usage

/cancel

Or say: "cancelomc", "stopomc"

Auto-Detection

/cancel follows the session-aware state contract:

• By default the command inspects the current session via state_list_active and state_get_status, navigating .omx/state/sessions/{sessionId}/… to discover which mode is active.
• When a session id is provided or already known, that session-scoped path is authoritative. Legacy files in .omx/state/*.json are consulted only as a compatibility fallback if the session id is missing or empty.
• Swarm is a shared SQLite/marker mode (.omx/state/swarm.db / .omx/state/swarm-active.marker) and is not session-scoped.
• The default cleanup flow calls state_clear with the session id to remove only the matching session files; modes stay bound to their originating session.

Normative Ralph cancellation post-conditions (MUST)

For Ralph-targeted cancellation (standalone or linked), completion is defined by post-conditions:

1. Target Ralph state is terminalized, not silently removed:
   • active=false
   • current_phase='cancelled'
   • completed_at is set (ISO timestamp)
2. If Ralph is linked to Ultrawork or Ecomode in the same scope, that linked mode is also terminalized/non-active.
3. Cancellation MUST remain scope-safe: no mutation of unrelated sessions.

See: docs/contracts/ralph-cancel-contract.md.

Active modes are still cancelled in dependency order:

1. Autopilot (includes linked ultragoal/ultraqa/ecomode cleanup plus explicit legacy Ralph cleanup)
2. Ralph (cleans its linked ultrawork or ecomode)
3. Ultrawork (standalone)
4. Ecomode (standalone)
5. UltraQA (standalone)
6. Swarm (standalone)
7. Ultrapilot (standalone)
8. Pipeline (standalone)
9. Team (tmux-based)
10. Plan Consensus (standalone)

Normative Ralph post-conditions (MUST)

When cancellation targets Ralph state in a scope, completion requires all of the following:

1. Ralph state is terminal in that same scope: active=false, current_phase='cancelled' (or linked terminal phase), and completed_at is set.
2. Linked Ultrawork/Ecomode in the same scope is also terminal/non-active.
3. Unrelated sessions are untouched.

Exact-scope force compatibility

--force is a compatibility flag for the same proven current scope as bare cancellation. It does not widen cancellation to other sessions, legacy roots, Team runtimes, or workspace artifacts. Its only additional behavior is exact-session native-stop cleanup after the same ownership checks.

--all is intentionally unsupported. Workspace-wide destructive cancellation requires a separately reviewed command and authority contract. Unknown flags and mixed flag combinations fail before mutation.

Exact canonical recovery under resumed ownership drift

The native PreToolUse exemption accepts an inherited non-empty NODE_EXTRA_CA_CERTS only for the exact canonical omx cancel command shape (and workflow-supported --force). This does not relax NODE_OPTIONS, loader/import hooks, OPENSSL_CONF, shell startup/function injection, PATH/PATHEXT shadowing, leading assignments, command chaining, noncanonical executable resolution, or unrelated commands.

For session-scoped cancellation, a stale top-level owner_codex_session_id in skill-active-state.json may be replaced—not aliased—only inside the existing cancellation transaction after the current pointer, native owner sidecar, canonical target session, and all nested owner/session evidence agree. Displaced owner evidence must be positively absent or stale/dead; live, malformed, foreign, indeterminate, nested-contradictory, or cross-session evidence fails closed. If the skill marker is absent, mode-only cancellation keeps its existing behavior and does not create one.

The replacement and terminal skill state are serialized as one final skill payload. Cancellation retains all-target prevalidation, O_NOFOLLOW, content/identity revalidation, per-file sync, and reverse rollback. These are in-process transaction guarantees, not crash-atomic multi-file visibility; rollback restoration failures are reported rather than presented as successful cleanup.

/cancel
/cancel --force

Argument contract

• no arguments: cancel only the provably current session/root scope;
• --force: same scope, plus exact-session native-stop cleanup;
• --all: reject without mutation;
• unknown or multiple flags: reject without mutation.

State discovery

Cancellation derives writable targets from the already-proven writable scope. Compatibility discovery may inform status, but never grants write authority. Unrelated session, legacy-root, Team, and run-dir state remains untouched unless it is independently proven as the exact cancellation target.

3B. Smart Cancellation (default)

If Team Active (tmux-based)

Teams are detected by checking for config files in .omx/state/team/:

# Check for active teams
ls .omx/state/team/*/config.json 2>/dev/null

Two-pass cancellation protocol:

Pass 1: Graceful Shutdown

For each team found in .omx/state/team/:
  1. Read config.json to get team_name and workers list
  2. For each worker:
     a. Write shutdown inbox to .omx/state/team/{name}/workers/{worker}/inbox.md
     b. Send short trigger via tmux send-keys
     c. Wait up to 15 seconds for worker tmux pane to exit
     d. If still alive: mark as unresponsive

Pass 2: Force Kill

After graceful pass:
  1. For each remaining alive worker:
     a. Send C-c via tmux send-keys
     b. Wait 2 seconds
     c. Kill the tmux window if still alive
  2. Destroy the tmux session: tmux kill-session -t omx-team-{name}

Cleanup:

  1. Strip AGENTS.md team worker overlay (<!-- OMX:TEAM:WORKER:START/END -->)
  2. Remove team state directory: rm -rf .omx/state/team/{name}/
  3. Clear team mode state: state_clear(mode="team")
  4. Emit structured cancel report

Structured Cancel Report:

Team "{team_name}" cancelled:
  - Workers signaled: N
  - Graceful exits: M
  - Force killed: K
  - tmux session destroyed: yes/no
  - State cleaned up: yes/no

Implementation note: The cancel skill is executed by the LLM, not as a bash script. When you detect an active team:

1. Check .omx/state/team/*/config.json for active teams
2. For each worker in config.workers, write shutdown inbox and send trigger
3. Wait briefly for workers to exit (15s timeout)
4. Force kill remaining workers via tmux
5. Destroy tmux session: tmux kill-session -t omx-team-{name}
6. Strip AGENTS.md overlay
7. Remove state: rm -rf .omx/state/team/{name}/
8. state_clear(mode="team")
9. Report structured summary to user

If Autopilot Active

Call cancelAutopilot() from src/hooks/autopilot/cancel.ts:27-78:

# Autopilot handles its own cleanup + ralph + ultraqa
# Just mark autopilot as inactive (preserves state for resume)
if [[ -f .omx/state/autopilot-state.json ]]; then
  # Clean up ralph if active
  if [[ -f .omx/state/ralph-state.json ]]; then
    RALPH_STATE=$(cat .omx/state/ralph-state.json)
    LINKED_UW=$(echo "$RALPH_STATE" | jq -r '.linked_ultrawork // false')

    # Clean linked ultrawork first
    if [[ "$LINKED_UW" == "true" ]] && [[ -f .omx/state/ultrawork-state.json ]]; then
      rm -f .omx/state/ultrawork-state.json
      echo "Cleaned up: ultrawork (linked to ralph)"
    fi

    # Clean ralph
    rm -f .omx/state/ralph-state.json
    rm -f .omx/state/ralph-verification.json
    echo "Cleaned up: ralph"
  fi

  # Clean up ultraqa if active
  if [[ -f .omx/state/ultraqa-state.json ]]; then
    rm -f .omx/state/ultraqa-state.json
    echo "Cleaned up: ultraqa"
  fi

  # Mark autopilot inactive but preserve state
  CURRENT_STATE=$(cat .omx/state/autopilot-state.json)
  CURRENT_PHASE=$(echo "$CURRENT_STATE" | jq -r '.phase // "unknown"')
  echo "$CURRENT_STATE" | jq '.active = false' > .omx/state/autopilot-state.json

  echo "Autopilot cancelled at phase: $CURRENT_PHASE. Progress preserved for resume."
  echo "Run /autopilot to resume."
fi

If Ralph Active (but not Autopilot)

Call clearRalphState() + clearLinkedUltraworkState() from src/hooks/ralph-loop/index.ts:147-182:

if [[ -f .omx/state/ralph-state.json ]]; then
  # Check if ultrawork is linked
  RALPH_STATE=$(cat .omx/state/ralph-state.json)
  LINKED_UW=$(echo "$RALPH_STATE" | jq -r '.linked_ultrawork // false')

  # Clean linked ultrawork first
  if [[ "$LINKED_UW" == "true" ]] && [[ -f .omx/state/ultrawork-state.json ]]; then
    UW_STATE=$(cat .omx/state/ultrawork-state.json)
    UW_LINKED=$(echo "$UW_STATE" | jq -r '.linked_to_ralph // false')

    # Only clear if it was linked to ralph
    if [[ "$UW_LINKED" == "true" ]]; then
      rm -f .omx/state/ultrawork-state.json
      echo "Cleaned up: ultrawork (linked to ralph)"
    fi
  fi

  # Clean ralph state
  rm -f .omx/state/ralph-state.json
  rm -f .omx/state/ralph-plan-state.json
  rm -f .omx/state/ralph-verification.json

  echo "Ralph cancelled. Persistent mode deactivated."
fi

If Ultrawork Active (standalone, not linked)

Call deactivateUltrawork() from src/hooks/ultrawork/index.ts:150-173:

if [[ -f .omx/state/ultrawork-state.json ]]; then
  # Check if linked to ralph
  UW_STATE=$(cat .omx/state/ultrawork-state.json)
  LINKED=$(echo "$UW_STATE" | jq -r '.linked_to_ralph // false')

  if [[ "$LINKED" == "true" ]]; then
    echo "Ultrawork is linked to Ralph. Use /cancel to cancel both."
    exit 1
  fi

  # Remove local state
  rm -f .omx/state/ultrawork-state.json

  echo "Ultrawork cancelled. Parallel execution mode deactivated."
fi

If UltraQA Active (standalone)

Call clearUltraQAState() from src/hooks/ultraqa/index.ts:107-120:

if [[ -f .omx/state/ultraqa-state.json ]]; then
  rm -f .omx/state/ultraqa-state.json
  echo "UltraQA cancelled. QA cycling workflow stopped."
fi

No Active Modes

echo "No active OMX modes detected."
echo ""
echo "Checked for:"
echo "  - Autopilot (.omx/state/autopilot-state.json)"
echo "  - Ralph (.omx/state/ralph-state.json)"
echo "  - Ultrawork (.omx/state/ultrawork-state.json)"
echo "  - UltraQA (.omx/state/ultraqa-state.json)"
echo ""
echo "Use --force for exact-session native-stop cleanup without widening scope."

Implementation Notes

The cancel skill runs as follows:

1. Parse arguments strictly. Bare cancellation and a single --force are accepted; --all, unknown flags, and multiple flags fail before mutation.
2. Resolve one writable scope and treat compatibility discovery as read-only.
3. Cancel only active state files whose exact scope, ownership fields, and frozen file identity are proven.
4. With --force, remove only the selected session's native-stop entry after the same proof and revalidation.
5. Leave unrelated sessions, legacy compatibility roots, Team artifacts, and tmux sessions untouched.

Mode-specific subsections below describe same-scope dependency ordering only.

Messages Reference

What Gets Preserved

Notes

• Dependency-aware: Autopilot cancellation cleans up Ultragoal/UltraQA state and any explicit legacy Ralph state
• Link-aware: Ralph cancellation cleans up linked Ultrawork or Ecomode
• Safe: Only clears linked Ultrawork, preserves standalone Ultrawork
• Local-only: Clears state files in .omx/state/ directory
• Resume-friendly: Autopilot state is preserved for seamless resume
• Team-aware: Team cancellation is permitted only when the selected state carries exact same-scope Team authority; unrelated Team artifacts and tmux sessions remain untouched.

Tmux Team Cleanup

Cancellation MUST NOT enumerate or kill every omx-team-* session and MUST NOT recursively delete .omx/state/team/. Team shutdown requires the exact frozen Team root, internal name, session, leader pane, and runtime identity selected by the authorized state transition. When that proof is unavailable or changes, cancellation fails closed without signals, pane actions, overlay edits, or Team-state deletion.

--force does not widen Team scope. It only enables exact-session native-stop cleanup after the same authority checks.