Let a person take the wheel without being offered it - #166
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Take control only appeared once a Bot had called computer_request_help, so the button a person needs depended on the Bot getting one instruction right. It does not always. Asked to open a page behind a sign-in, the built-in Bot answered "If you'd like, I can prompt you to take control so you can complete the sign-in ... would you like to proceed with signing in?" and called nothing. Three times out of three, on a neutral question. The person was told to take control and there was no control to take, and the computer panel offered nothing: a dead end reached by following the Bot's own instruction. The prompt already forbids that sentence in as many words, and names two more like it, so the answer is not more prose. It is that somebody who wants their own browser should not have to be offered it first. The button is now there whenever the Bot holds the wheel. The amber row stays the Bot ASKING, which is a different thing and keeps its colour and its reason. Without a request the row is quiet and says who is driving. Driven in Chrome. Reproduced the prose answer, then took the wheel from that state: holder went to human with requested still false, the sign-in page was live and typeable in the full-size view, and handing back returned the Bot to driving. Leaves the Bot's behaviour alone. It should still call the tool, and a prompt that cannot make it is worth its own change.
davidmckayv
requested review from
MikeRyanDev,
guidovizoso and
tylerslaton
as code owners
August 22, 2026 14:55
…ys-take-the-wheel
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Found while testing the four open PRs against latest main, and separate from all of them.
What was wrong
Take control only appeared once a Bot had called
computer_request_help. So the button a person needs depended on the Bot getting one instruction right — and it does not always.Asked, in a fresh channel, a completely neutral question:
the built-in General Assistant answered:
Three times out of three.
control.requestedstayedfalse, so the computer panel offered nothing. The person is told to take control, and there is no control to take — a dead end reached by following the Bot's own instruction.Why not fix the prompt
COMPUTER_GUIDANCEalready forbids this in as many words, and names three example sentences it must never write:The Bot wrote "would you like me to prompt you to sign in" anyway. More prose is not the answer to prose that is already being ignored.
The answer is that somebody who wants their own browser should not have to be offered it first. That makes the Bot's failure an annoyance rather than a dead end — which is what it should always have been.
What changes
The button is there whenever the Bot holds the wheel, in the inline card and in the full-size view.
The amber row stays the Bot asking — a different thing, and it keeps its colour and its reason. Without a request the row is quiet and simply says who is driving: "The assistant is driving. You can take over whenever you want."
Driven in Chrome
GET /control→{"holder":"human","requested":false}— a person holding a wheel the Bot never offered.holder: botand the row went back to the quiet offer.What this does not do
It leaves the Bot's behaviour alone. It should still call
computer_request_help, and a prompt that cannot reliably make it do so is worth its own change — this one just stops that failure from trapping anybody.