Grok Bot ExternalShell blocked despite Always allow

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1

Where does the bug appear (feature/product)?

Somewhere else…

Describe the Bug

User has Settings → Agent → Execution on Local Computer → Always allow. Persisted setting on the box confirms localToolPermission: “always” with no localToolPermissionCeiling. Repeated ExternalShell calls still fail immediately with the canned UNAPPROVED message. No approval card appears in the UI. Same failure class was also seen from another agent’s subagent (Chief of Staff / LinkedIn resume probe) on the same account today.

Steps to Reproduce

  1. Ensure Execution on Local Computer = Always allow (user reports UI shows this; box settings file matches).
  2. From agent Aristotle, invoke ExternalShell with a trivial command, e.g. echo probe && whoami && hostname.
  3. Observe immediate failure with the UNAPPROVED text above.
  4. Observe no local-computer approval card.

Expected Behavior

I was prompted to permit Grok Bot agents to run local commands and clicked always allow. Confirmed this in settings. I would like that setting to be honored so they can run commands locally on my machine.

Screenshots / Screen Recordings

grok bot external shell issue.jpg
grok bot external shell issue.jpg1614×1700 410 KB

Operating System

MacOS

Version Information

Grok Bot
Version: 0.16.0
Release Track: stable
OS: darwin

For AI issues: which model did you use?

Uncertain, Grok Bot

For AI issues: add Request ID with privacy disabled

Convo ID: Aristotle (agent c639e327-8b81-4c79-b51f-89a3e666a6c6)
machineId bf711521-95e8-47ba-bda9-f240cc5fb88f

Additional Information

The agent generated a bug report Markdown to provide to you, I am e-mailing that to [email protected] with a link to this topic.

Does this stop you from using Cursor

No - Cursor works, but with this issue

6

Hey! Thanks for the detailed report. Your Always allow setting is genuinely set, so this isn’t something you misconfigured - it’s an issue we’re tracking. To unblock you now:

  1. Fully quit Grok Bot with Cmd+Q (closing the window isn’t enough).
  2. In Terminal, run ps aux | grep local-exec-daemon and kill any leftover processes.
  3. Relaunch Grok Bot.
  4. In Settings → Agent → Execution on Local Computer, switch to Ask every time, then back to Always allow.

Updating alone won’t clear this, so run the steps even on the newest build. Let me know if ExternalShell still errors afterward.