Human-in-the-loop required

Good AI agents don’t apply irreversible changes silently: git push --force, DROP TABLE, DB migration, prod rollout — all of these require human approval. A plain stdout prompt works poorly in this situation: you’re somewhere in a cafe, your laptop is closed, the agent is hanging and burning the context window.

Notifly solves this with a push + a public callback URL.

Minimal template: “press the button to continue”

import os, secrets, time, requests
from http.server import BaseHTTPRequestHandler, HTTPServer
from threading import Thread

NOTIFLY = (os.environ["NOTIFLY_URL"], os.environ["NOTIFLY_TOKEN"])

def ask_human(question, callback_base):
    """
    Поднимает локальный httpd на свободном порту, ждёт approve/deny.
    callback_base — публичный URL (через Cloudflare Tunnel / ngrok / fly.io),
    чтобы можно было нажать с телефона.
    """
    token   = secrets.token_urlsafe(8)
    answer  = {}

    class H(BaseHTTPRequestHandler):
        def do_GET(self):
            if token not in self.path:
                self.send_response(404); self.end_headers(); return
            answer["v"] = "approve" if "approve" in self.path else "deny"
            self.send_response(200); self.end_headers()
            self.wfile.write(b"OK, you can close this tab.")
        def log_message(self, *a, **kw): pass

    httpd = HTTPServer(("127.0.0.1", 0), H)
    port  = httpd.server_address[1]
    Thread(target=httpd.serve_forever, daemon=True).start()

    base = callback_base.rstrip("/")
    msg  = (f"{question}\n\n"
            f"✅ {base}/approve?t={token}\n"
            f"❌ {base}/deny?t={token}")

    requests.post(f"{NOTIFLY[0]}/message",
                  params={"token": NOTIFLY[1]},
                  json={"title": "🤖 Нужен approve", "message": msg, "priority": 9},
                  timeout=5)

    deadline = time.time() + 30*60
    while time.time() < deadline and "v" not in answer:
        time.sleep(2)
    httpd.shutdown()
    return answer.get("v", "timeout")

# usage:
verdict = ask_human(
    "Применить миграцию V234__drop_legacy_users.sql на prod?",
    callback_base="https://my-tunnel.example.com",
)
if verdict != "approve":
    raise SystemExit(f"abort: {verdict}")

Cloudflare Tunnel, ngrok http 0, a fly machine — any simple way to publish a local port. If you already have a prod URL — it’s better to use it (route /approve//deny there).

Without your own HTTP server: “confirm via web-script”

If the agent runs alongside the Notifly admin UI — create a pair of WebScript: one with type button_click and title: "Approved", the other — Denied. In the push message just send two links like https://your-notifly/script/T<approve_token> — a click sends a callback ping to your channel, the agent catches it via WebSocket or periodic poll GET /application/{id}/message.

Pro: no server at all. Con: polling or WebSocket needed on the agent side.

CLI agent: catch an approve prompt on stdout

Many CLI agents (Claude Code, Codex CLI, Aider) print a line like Approve? [y/n] to stdout. The simplest approach is to wrap them with expect:

#!/usr/bin/expect -f
spawn aider --auto-commit ...
expect {
  -re "Approve\\? \\[y/n\\]" {
      exec curl -fsS -X POST "$env(NOTIFLY_URL)/message?token=$env(NOTIFLY_TOKEN)" \
           -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
           -d "{\"title\":\"🤖 Aider ждёт approve\",\"message\":\"...\",\"priority\":9}"
      interact          # pass control to the user over ssh
  }
  eof
}

What is critical to include in the push

• Exactly what we’re doing. The command, file path, migration name, branch.
• What will happen on deny. So you can confidently press “no”.
• Diff / preview, if possible. Put a link to a gist in extras.
• Deadline. “Abort after 30 minutes” — then you can ignore it while at the bar.

Related recipes

• Finishing a long-running task — the opposite: “already done, go review”.
• WebScript — button-callback without your own HTTP.
• WebSocket protocol — so the agent instantly knows you pressed approve.