Read the state. Respond once. Verify the result.

Understand agent status

These labels follow Herdr’s agent-state model (opens in a new tab).

• Working: active. A new prompt may be accepted as a queued follow-up.
• Waiting for you: blocked on a question, approval, or interactive prompt.
• Idle or Done: no active approval response is currently expected.
• Unknown: HerdRanger cannot safely establish state. Review the connection and target.

The Agents navigator orders Blocked, Working, Done, Idle, then Unknown without changing Herdr’s saved order.

Output is not a fabricated transcript

The page shows a bounded read of current visible or recent terminal output. It can contain terminal text, code, diffs, tables, timers, and prompts, but is not guaranteed to be a complete conversation.

Review recent history asks Herdr for retained scrollback; Herdr may truncate it. The composer History popup stores up to 20 acknowledged instructions and 20 changed, encrypted local output snapshots for up to 30 days. These are convenient local records, not authoritative server transcripts, and clear when their agent or space is removed.

Send with a five-second review window

After Send, HerdRanger holds the cleaned draft locally for five seconds. Stop & edit cancels that local timer and returns the text to the composer. After Herdr acknowledges a prompt behind active work, it is labeled Queued and cannot be withdrawn through Herdr 0.9.0.

An acknowledgement means Herdr accepted the input; it does not mean the agent finished the resulting work. Failed, blocked, or unknown delivery keeps the draft. Unknown delivery is never replayed automatically.

Respond to an approval request

When the visible Codex screen (opens in a new tab) contains an unambiguous numbered choice menu, HerdRanger can show buttons using the menu’s exact labels. It does not substitute generic Yes/No actions. Review the request and refresh if another client may have changed it.

If there is no clear menu, type a custom response. A waiting-agent response uses Herdr’s structured pane-input path with Enter; it does not attach a terminal or take over its size and focus.

Use passive live view and interruption deliberately

Live view polls bounded visible output without attaching a writable terminal or sending input. Turn it off to hold a snapshot still while reviewing it.

The explicit Esc action is a confirmed remote input that can interrupt work. It is sent once; an uncertain result remains unknown and is not retried. Use Continue in live terminal only when an existing agent needs interactive login, OAuth, MFA, a passphrase, or a terminal-only response.