Harness settings

The Coding agents page in Settings shows how each agent harness on this device is configured: whether it keeps memories, how long it keeps conversation history, its default model, and its permission settings. Use it to find out whether a harness deletes history before Hansard can archive it, or why a harness has no memories. The page is available only in the app.

The page starts with Hansard in each agent, where you add, repair, or remove Hansard’s tools in each agent (see Recall in your agents), then Automatic setup and Plan usage. Its Memory and transcripts section only reads settings. Make those changes in the harness itself.

App

Settings → Coding agents

Review harness settings in the app

1. Open Settings → Coding agents.
2. Under Memory and transcripts, read the line under each harness. It states whether memory is on, such as Memory on or Memory off, and for Claude Code how long the CLI keeps transcripts, such as deletes transcripts after 30 days. Other harnesses have no local retention setting Hansard can read. A harness with nothing to report reads No memory or retention settings reported.
3. Select a harness to see its other settings, such as its default model, reasoning effort, and permission mode.
4. Expand Where these values come from to see which configuration files Hansard read and whether each was found, the setting key behind each value with a link to the harness’s documentation, and a note on what the setting does.
5. After you change a harness’s configuration, select Refresh.

Only harnesses with a configuration folder on this device appear. The page reads settings when you open it, so it needs no import.

What the page shows

Harness	Configuration file	Settings shown
Codex	~/.codex/config.toml	Local memories, memory generation and use, memory input age limit, prompt history persistence and size limit, default model, reasoning effort, approval policy, and sandbox mode.
Claude Code	~/.claude/settings.json	CLI transcript cleanup, Desktop and Cowork cleanup, auto memory, default model, permission mode, and sandbox.
Grok Build	~/.grok/config.toml	Cross-session memory, default model, and permission mode.
OpenCode	~/.config/opencode/opencode.json or opencode.jsonc	Default model, small model, and global permission.
Antigravity CLI	~/.gemini/antigravity-cli/settings.json	Tool permission, artifact review, terminal sandbox, and access outside the workspace.

Under Where these values come from, each setting shows where its value came from:

• Config file: the value comes from your configuration file.
• Default: the setting is not in your file, so the page shows the harness’s documented default.
• Not set: the setting has no value and no documented default, or Hansard could not read the file.

In the settings list, Not set means the setting is absent and has no documented default. Unknown means the file is unreadable or holds a value Hansard does not recognize. Neither means a feature is off or that history is kept forever.

Settings that affect your archive

History cleanup. Claude Code deletes CLI transcripts older than 30 days by default, controlled by cleanupPeriodDays. Its auto memory files are not deleted by this cleanup. Recent Claude Code versions keep Desktop and Cowork transcripts unless desktopSessionCleanupPeriodDays or a managed policy sets a limit. See the Claude Code application data reference for the current rules.

Codex memories. Codex generates memories only when its local memories feature is on. When Codex reads Memory off, the Memories view has no Codex entries. Saves memories without using them and Uses memories without saving new ones mean one of the two memory settings is off. See Codex memories.

Hansard keeps every conversation it has already archived, even after a harness deletes the original. To capture history before a harness removes it, run a full import once and keep the watcher running. See Background archiving.

Limits

• The page shows user-level settings only. A running session can behave differently because of project settings, profiles, environment variables, command-line flags, app preferences, or managed policy.
• Hansard does not check which version of each harness is installed.
• The page is available from a local connection to the app, including read-only mode. It is not available over a remote connection.