Patch release 1.0.19: a terminal-native theme (gradual rollout), bundled skills for long-running work and status-line setup, a deep-research workflow, and clearer worktree / scheduled-task / org-policy behavior.
Changelog
[new]Terminal theme — sixth built-in theme (terminal / terminal-default / transparent / native) that paints no surface backgrounds and uses your terminal’s default foreground plus its 16-color ANSI palette, so translucency and background images show through. Readable on light or dark profiles without appearance detection. Rolling out gradually; until it reaches your account it stays hidden from /theme and /settings. Opt in early with GROK_TERMINAL_THEME=1 or [features] terminal_theme = true in config.toml.
[new]Bundled skill: long-running-background-tasks — guidance and helpers for launching and supervising work that keeps running after start (dev servers, PRs/CI, training runs, builds). Includes watch_dev_server.sh, watch_pr.py, and watch_training.py. Triggers when starting, watching, diagnosing, or reporting on long-lived jobs; defines done as verified successful completion, not just queueing.
[new]Bundled skill: statusline — configures [ui.status_line] in the user config (built-in segments, custom script, or off). Use when the user asks to set up or change the status line.
[new]Bundled workflow: deep-research — plans independent research questions, gathers claims in parallel, cross-checks evidence, and writes a cited report. Use via /deep-research or when the user asks to research, compare, or produce a sourced write-up.
[new]Figma plugin skills — figma-generative-plugins (load before generative plugin create/update) and figma-shaders (load before shader create/update).
[new]Vercel plugin skill: flags-sdk — Flags SDK and Vercel Flags guidance (declaring flags, provider adapters, and related wiring).
[changed]Scheduled / recurring tasks — each fire runs in a detached background subagent, not as a turn in your conversation. The stored prompt must stand alone; only the result returns. There is no option to run a fire as a main-conversation turn.
[changed]--worktree / -w — creates a worktree from the current checkout (dirty changes included) and runs the session there; starting from a subdirectory lands in the same path inside the worktree. With -r, the session resumes into the new worktree. Not combinable with --fork-session. Completions no longer claim headless (-p) skips worktree creation. With --ref / --worktree-ref, the worktree is a clean checkout of that ref (no dirty overlay).
[changed]/usage — from a session, opens the usage modal with account allowance plus that session’s context and token totals; from the Agent Dashboard, the same modal opens over the dashboard with only the Usage limit tab populated (no active session).
[changed]Org marketplace allowlists — presence of strictKnownMarketplaces restricts adds; an empty, malformed, or all-unsupported list is a full lockdown until fixed. local entries in the strict list are dropped with a warning and never allow anything.
[changed]Org MCP allow/deny policy — misconfigured policy keys lock that file’s MCP policy down (every bound server blocked) instead of failing open. Allow-list serverUrl matching is stricter on scheme/port; deny entries match host/path across schemes and ports. A present empty allowedMcpServers blocks every server the file binds.
[changed]grok clone docs — daemon auto-start when the control socket is down, grove resolution from PATH or next to grok, Linux FUSE requirements (hard error with install hints), macOS KeepAlive via grove doctor --install-agent, and Windows not supported.
[changed]Marketplace plugins — Figma, Vercel, Stripe, and pstack pin newer source revisions; Vercel ai-gateway and vercel-storage skill descriptions updated (including Global Config, formerly Edge Config).
Under the hood
Feature flag features.terminal_theme / GROK_TERMINAL_THEME gates early access to the terminal theme during rollout.
Bundled content set bumped to public-2026-09-03-r1 (new skills, deep-research workflow, and related assets).
Shell completions (zsh, fish, elvish, PowerShell) refreshed for worktree flag help text.
Live model surface lists grok-4.5 and grok-4.6 (default remains grok-4.6 where configured by the service).
Upgrade notes
Existing scheduled tasks always fire as background subagents; prompts that relied on live conversation context need to be rewritten to be self-contained.
If you use --worktree in headless or resume flows, re-read the updated headless and worktree docs—behavior and combinations with -r / --fork-session are more explicit than before.
Org admins: do not ship empty strict_known_marketplaces or allowed_mcp_servers lists as scaffolds—they lock down adds or MCP until corrected. Check grok inspect for locked-down policy files after upgrade.
