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Manual, Agent and Pair modes; ‘another client is taking over’

You might be here because: “what is Pair mode” · “how do I take over from the AI” · “You’re driving — agent is paused” · “Another client is currently taking over this agent session” · “Pair-mode takeover already in flight” · “can I control the phone myself” · “The item changed or is busy. Refresh and try again” · “take control from the AI” · “AI won’t stop”

Short answer

A session runs in one of three modes. Manual: you drive by tapping the screen. Agent: the AI drives and you watch. Pair: the AI drives, and Take control stops the agent’s current task so you drive; Hand back to agent returns control, and the agent carries on once you send it a message. “Another client is taking over” means a second window or computer grabbed control of the same session at the same moment; refresh and try again.

Check first

  • The caption under the screen names the current mode: “Manual — tap the screen to drive”, “Agent is driving — watching live”, “Pair — agent drives. Press Take control to drive”, “You’re driving — agent is paused”.
  • Do you have the same session open in two windows or on two computers?

Likely causes and fixes

  1. You want to control the session while the AI works. Use Pair mode and press Take control; the caption changes to “You’re driving — agent is paused” and the screen takes your taps and typing. Press Hand back to agent when you are done, then tell the agent to carry on: taking control stopped its task.

  2. Takeover refused. The server answers HTTP 409 “Pair-mode takeover already in flight — Another client (…) is currently taking over this agent session.” when two clients try at once. The desktop app shows “The item changed or is busy. Refresh and try again.”. Fix: wait a moment, refresh, and only one window should drive.

  3. “Invalid pair-mode transition”: the session is not in a state that allows that change (for example, a take-over while a hand-back is still pending). Refresh and read the caption again.

  4. Modes from code. A session your program runs is in ai mode; manual and pair are desktop-app modes and their controls are not part of the public API.

If it still fails

If control never returns after a takeover, close the extra windows, stop the session and launch again. If it repeats, press Talk to a person in this chat (or open Help) and include the session id.