fix(stream): cap StreamChannel per-subscriber queues (drop-oldest on full)

Memory: each connected tab's subscriber queue was queue.Queue() with no
maxsize. A slow/backpressured/backgrounded tab accumulated every coalesced
token frame for the WHOLE turn (producer = agent token stream) — unbounded
per-tab growth, OOM risk with many tabs x long agentic turns. The offline
buffer was already capped (#4633), but once a subscriber attached the
live-broadcast path flowed into an unbounded per-subscriber queue.

Cap per-subscriber queues at _SUBSCRIBER_QUEUE_MAXSIZE (== _OFFLINE_BUFFER_MAXLEN)
and drop the OLDEST frame on queue.Full in both the broadcast (put_nowait) and
offline-buffer replay (subscribe_with_snapshot) paths, so a slow tab keeps the
most recent tail (older frames stay recoverable via the run journal by
last_event_id). Mirrors SessionChannel.emit's drop-on-full contract.

The cap intentionally equals the offline buffer bound, not SessionChannel's
smaller 16: StreamChannel carries the live token stream and has a #4633
reconnect-replay contract (a resubscribing tab must receive the full retained
offline tail), so capping below the buffer would force every flaky-network
reconnect through the run journal. Matching the buffer bound preserves that
contract while bounding live-broadcast memory to the same worst-case #4633
already accepts. The SSE write deadline (SSE_WRITE_DEADLINE_SECONDS) breaks a
stuck socket within ~20s, so the overflow window is short; this also bounds it
by frame count.

Adds a cumulative subscriber_dropped_events diagnostic counter (ops visibility).

Test: tests/test_stream_subscriber_queue_cap.py — bounded queue never exceeds
cap, drop-oldest keeps newest tail, draining vs non-draining subscribers, and
the #4633 reconnect-replay contract still delivers the full offline tail.
Existing offline-buffer/gap-recovery/multitab tests unchanged.

Contract Routing
- Task type: memory-bound fix (unbounded per-subscriber queue).
- Touched areas: live chat SSE broadcast (StreamChannel).
- Relevant public docs: AGENTS.md, CONTRIBUTING.md, docs/CONTRACTS.md,
  docs/rfcs/webui-run-state-consistency-contract.md (Live stream/SSE layer),
  docs/rfcs/session-sse-contract-v1.md (distinct: that RFC governs the PROPOSED
  per-session endpoint /api/sessions/{id}/events, NOT StreamChannel, which is
  the /api/chat/stream live token broadcast; no text in that RFC is changed).
- State layer mutated: Live stream / SSE layer — specifically the per-subscriber
  queue inside StreamChannel (api/config.py). NOT the durable run journal, NOT
  the transcript, NOT replay.
- Invariant preserved: the #4633 reconnect-replay contract — a resubscribing
  tab must receive the full retained offline tail. The cap is set EQUAL to
  _OFFLINE_BUFFER_MAXLEN so replay delivery is unchanged; only the previously-
  unbounded live-broadcast-to-slow-tab growth is bounded. Regression:
  test_reconnect_replay_still_delivers_full_offline_tail (and the pre-existing
  test_stream_offline_buffer_cap.py suite) pass unchanged.
- Scope boundaries: does not touch replay idempotency (Invariant 5), the turn
  journal, compression, or sidebar metadata. Slow-tab frames dropped at the cap
  stay recoverable via the run journal by last_event_id.

Release note: StreamChannel per-subscriber SSE queues are now bounded
(drop-oldest), capping memory for slow/backgrounded tabs during long turns.

Model Used: builtin:zai-coding-plan/GLM-5.2 (ZCode agent). No AI-specific tool
use mattered beyond the repo's standard read/edit/test workflow.

api/config.py

@@ -8401,9 +8401,30 @@ class StreamChannel:
     # recoverable via the run journal by last_event_id. 8192 is generous enough
     # to hold a long multi-tool turn's backlog while capping worst-case memory to
     # a fixed number of small (event, data, id) tuples — deliberately far above
-    # SessionChannel's per-subscriber maxsize of 16 (that queue drops on a *slow*
-    # reader; this buffer must survive a legitimate reconnect gap).
+    # the per-subscriber queue cap below (that queue drops on a *slow* reader;
+    # this buffer must survive a legitimate reconnect gap).
     _OFFLINE_BUFFER_MAXLEN = 8192
+    # Per-subscriber queue cap (drop-oldest on full). Each connected tab gets its
+    # own queue; a slow/backpressured or backgrounded tab used to hold an
+    # UNBOUNDED queue.Queue that grew for the WHOLE turn (the producer is the
+    # agent token stream), an OOM risk with many tabs × long agentic turns. This
+    # caps the per-tab live-broadcast growth to a fixed bound.
+    #
+    # Bound is intentionally EQUAL to _OFFLINE_BUFFER_MAXLEN, not the much
+    # smaller SessionChannel per-subscriber cap of 16. StreamChannel carries the
+    # live chat token stream (thousands of frames per turn) and, unlike
+    # SessionChannel's low-frequency UI pings, has a reconnect-replay contract:
+    # a tab that briefly disconnected must receive the full retained offline
+    # tail on resubscribe. Capping below the offline buffer would truncate that
+    # replay and force every flaky-network reconnect through the run journal
+    # (disk reads) instead of the in-memory fast path. Matching the offline
+    # buffer bound preserves that contract while bounding live-broadcast memory
+    # to the SAME worst-case #4633 already accepted (a fixed number of small
+    # (event, data, id) tuples). The SSE write deadline
+    # (SSE_WRITE_DEADLINE_SECONDS) independently breaks a stuck socket within
+    # ~20s, so the overflow window is short; this cap bounds it by frame count
+    # too. Older frames stay recoverable via the run journal by last_event_id.
+    _SUBSCRIBER_QUEUE_MAXSIZE = _OFFLINE_BUFFER_MAXLEN
 
     def __init__(self):
         self._lock = threading.Lock()
@@ -8424,6 +8445,9 @@ class StreamChannel:
         # Cumulative evictions over the channel's lifetime, never reset — for ops
         # visibility via diagnostic_snapshot().
         self._offline_dropped_total = 0
+        # Cumulative per-subscriber queue drops over the channel's lifetime
+        # (broadcast + replay paths), never reset — ops visibility for slow tabs.
+        self._subscriber_dropped_total = 0
         self._last_event_id: str | None = None
 
     def subscribe(self) -> queue.Queue:
@@ -8431,15 +8455,41 @@ class StreamChannel:
         return q
 
     def subscribe_with_snapshot(self) -> tuple[queue.Queue, dict[str, object]]:
-        q: queue.Queue = queue.Queue()
+        q: queue.Queue = queue.Queue(maxsize=self._SUBSCRIBER_QUEUE_MAXSIZE)
         with self._lock:
             # Replay buffered events to the new subscriber INSIDE the lock so a
             # concurrent put_nowait() can't broadcast a newer event before we
-            # finish replaying the older buffered tail. queue.Queue.put_nowait
-            # is non-blocking on an unbounded queue, so holding the lock here
-            # is safe. Per Opus advisor on stage-292.
+            # finish replaying the older buffered tail. The queue is bounded, so
+            # put_nowait raises queue.Full once the cap is reached — drop the
+            # OLDEST already-replayed frame and retry, keeping the most recent
+            # tail (a reconnecting tab needs the tail; older frames stay
+            # recoverable via the run journal by last_event_id). Holding the
+            # lock here is safe: no other put_nowait() can interleave. Per Opus
+            # advisor on stage-292.
+            replayed_dropped = 0
             for item in self._offline_buffer:
-                q.put_nowait(item)
+                while True:
+                    try:
+                        q.put_nowait(item)
+                        break
+                    except queue.Full:
+                        # Drop oldest to make room for the newer (more useful)
+                        # tail frame. The drained frame is the oldest in this
+                        # subscriber's replay window only.
+                        try:
+                            q.get_nowait()
+                        except queue.Empty:
+                            break  # cap 0 defensive guard; never reached
+                        replayed_dropped += 1
+            if replayed_dropped:
+                self._subscriber_dropped_total += replayed_dropped
+                logger.debug(
+                    "StreamChannel subscriber replay dropped %d oldest frames "
+                    "(cap=%d) while catching up on %d buffered events",
+                    replayed_dropped,
+                    self._SUBSCRIBER_QUEUE_MAXSIZE,
+                    len(self._offline_buffer),
+                )
             first = self._offline_buffer[0] if self._offline_buffer else None
             snapshot = {
                 "offline_buffered_events": len(self._offline_buffer),
@@ -8500,8 +8550,34 @@ class StreamChannel:
             # reports and logs its own truncation, not a stale carry-over.
             self._offline_buffer.clear()
             self._offline_dropped = 0
+        # Broadcast outside the lock so a slow put_nowait doesn't block other
+        # subscribers or producers. The queue is bounded; on queue.Full drop the
+        # OLDEST frame and retry so a slow/backpressured tab keeps its most
+        # recent tail instead of growing unbounded for the whole turn. Older
+        # frames stay recoverable via the run journal by last_event_id. Mirrors
+        # SessionChannel.emit's drop-on-full contract.
+        broadcast_dropped = 0
         for q in subscribers:
-            q.put_nowait(item)
+            while True:
+                try:
+                    q.put_nowait(item)
+                    break
+                except queue.Full:
+                    try:
+                        q.get_nowait()
+                    except queue.Empty:
+                        break  # cap 0 defensive guard; never reached
+                    broadcast_dropped += 1
+        if broadcast_dropped:
+            with self._lock:
+                self._subscriber_dropped_total += broadcast_dropped
+            logger.debug(
+                "StreamChannel broadcast dropped %d oldest frames across %d "
+                "subscriber queue(s) (cap=%d)",
+                broadcast_dropped,
+                len(subscribers),
+                self._SUBSCRIBER_QUEUE_MAXSIZE,
+            )
 
     def diagnostic_snapshot(self) -> dict[str, object]:
         """Return non-sensitive stream observation counters for health checks."""
@@ -8512,6 +8588,9 @@ class StreamChannel:
                 # Cumulative over the channel lifetime (ops visibility), vs. the
                 # per-cycle count subscribe_with_snapshot() reports for truncation.
                 "offline_dropped_events": self._offline_dropped_total,
+                # Cumulative per-subscriber queue drops (replay + broadcast) over
+                # the channel lifetime — surfaces slow/backpressured tabs.
+                "subscriber_dropped_events": self._subscriber_dropped_total,
             }
 
 

tests/test_stream_subscriber_queue_cap.py

@@ -0,0 +1,165 @@
+"""Regression tests: ``StreamChannel`` per-subscriber queues are bounded.
+
+Each connected browser tab gets its own ``queue.Queue`` to receive broadcast
+SSE frames. That queue used to be ``queue.Queue()`` (no maxsize), so a slow /
+backpressured / backgrounded tab accumulated every coalesced token frame for the
+WHOLE turn (the producer is the agent token stream) — an OOM risk with many tabs
+× long agentic turns. The sibling offline buffer was already capped (#4633), but
+once a subscriber attached, events flowed into its unbounded per-subscriber
+queue.
+
+The subscriber queue is now ``queue.Queue(maxsize=_SUBSCRIBER_QUEUE_MAXSIZE)``
+and both the broadcast path (``put_nowait``) and the offline-buffer replay path
+(``subscribe_with_snapshot``) drop the OLDEST frame on ``queue.Full`` so a slow
+tab keeps the most recent tail (older frames stay recoverable via the run
+journal by ``last_event_id``).
+
+The cap equals ``_OFFLINE_BUFFER_MAXLEN`` so a reconnecting tab can still replay
+the full retained offline tail (the #4633 reconnect contract); the point of the
+bound is to cap the previously-unbounded LIVE-broadcast-to-slow-tab growth — a
+50K-frame turn can no longer pin all 50000 frames per slow tab.
+"""
+from __future__ import annotations
+
+import queue as _queue
+
+from api.config import StreamChannel, create_stream_channel
+
+
+def _drain(q: _queue.Queue) -> list:
+    out = []
+    while True:
+        try:
+            out.append(q.get_nowait())
+        except _queue.Empty:
+            break
+    return out
+
+
+def test_subscriber_queue_has_a_maxsize_bound():
+    """The regression: a subscriber queue MUST be bounded (it used to be 0 ==
+    unbounded). Assert the cap is set and finite, and matches the documented
+    reconnect-replay bound."""
+    ch = create_stream_channel()
+    q = ch.subscribe()
+    assert q.maxsize > 0
+    assert q.maxsize == StreamChannel._SUBSCRIBER_QUEUE_MAXSIZE
+    assert q.maxsize == StreamChannel._OFFLINE_BUFFER_MAXLEN
+
+
+def test_broadcast_drops_oldest_when_subscriber_never_drains():
+    """A subscriber that never drains stays bounded by the queue cap and keeps
+    the most recent tail (drop-oldest), not the oldest frames — even when the
+    producer emits far more frames than the cap."""
+    ch = create_stream_channel()
+    cap = StreamChannel._SUBSCRIBER_QUEUE_MAXSIZE
+    q = ch.subscribe()
+
+    # Subscribe a second, draining subscriber so put_nowait takes the live
+    # broadcast path (subscribers present) rather than the offline buffer.
+    drainer = ch.subscribe()
+    total = cap + 500  # produce more than the cap; the slow tab must drop
+    for i in range(total):
+        ch.put_nowait(("token", i, f"id{i}"))
+        # Keep the drainer empty so broadcast always has a live audience.
+        _drain(drainer)
+
+    # The never-drained subscriber never exceeded the cap.
+    assert q.qsize() <= cap
+    kept = _drain(q)
+    # The most recent `cap` frames are retained; the 500 older ones were dropped.
+    assert len(kept) == cap
+    assert kept[0] == ("token", total - cap, f"id{total - cap}")
+    assert kept[-1] == ("token", total - 1, f"id{total - 1}")
+
+    # Ops counter surfaced the cumulative drops.
+    snap = ch.diagnostic_snapshot()
+    assert snap["subscriber_dropped_events"] >= 500
+
+
+def test_replay_drops_oldest_when_offline_buffer_exceeds_queue_cap():
+    """subscribe_with_snapshot replays buffered frames into a bounded queue. The
+    default cap equals the offline buffer, so replay just fits and never drops.
+    To exercise the replay drop-on-full path, monkeypatch the cap SMALLER than
+    the buffer, then call the REAL subscribe_with_snapshot (not a hand-mirrored
+    loop) so the test stays coupled to the production code path under test."""
+    ch = create_stream_channel()
+    buffer_len = StreamChannel._OFFLINE_BUFFER_MAXLEN
+    # Drive the offline buffer with no subscriber attached (fills buffer past
+    # overflow, so the retained tail is exactly `buffer_len` frames).
+    for i in range(buffer_len + 100):
+        ch.put_nowait(("token", i, f"id{i}"))
+
+    small_cap = 8
+    original_cap = StreamChannel._SUBSCRIBER_QUEUE_MAXSIZE
+    StreamChannel._SUBSCRIBER_QUEUE_MAXSIZE = small_cap
+    try:
+        # The default cap equals the buffer, so a resubscribe normally replays
+        # the full retained tail. With the cap forced small, replay must drop
+        # oldest and keep the newest `small_cap` frames — exercising the real
+        # drop-on-full branch inside subscribe_with_snapshot.
+        q, snapshot = ch.subscribe_with_snapshot()
+    finally:
+        StreamChannel._SUBSCRIBER_QUEUE_MAXSIZE = original_cap
+
+    drained = _drain(q)
+    assert len(drained) == small_cap
+    # Newest tail retained.
+    assert drained[-1] == ("token", buffer_len + 100 - 1, f"id{buffer_len + 100 - 1}")
+    # Oldest retained frame is `small_cap` back from the end.
+    assert drained[0] == ("token", buffer_len + 100 - small_cap, f"id{buffer_len + 100 - small_cap}")
+    # The cumulative drop counter was incremented by the replay path.
+    assert ch._subscriber_dropped_total >= 1
+
+
+def test_broadcast_to_many_subscribers_stays_bounded():
+    """Multiple subscribers, one of which never drains, never exceeds any
+    queue's cap and the draining subscribers receive every frame."""
+    ch = create_stream_channel()
+    cap = StreamChannel._SUBSCRIBER_QUEUE_MAXSIZE
+    slow = ch.subscribe()
+    fast = ch.subscribe()
+
+    total = cap + 10  # a little over the cap is enough to force one drop
+    fast_seen = []
+    for i in range(total):
+        ch.put_nowait(("token", i, f"id{i}"))
+        fast_seen.extend(_drain(fast))
+
+    # The fast (draining) subscriber got every frame in order.
+    assert fast_seen == [("token", i, f"id{i}") for i in range(total)]
+    # The slow subscriber stayed bounded and kept the newest tail.
+    assert slow.qsize() <= cap
+    slow_kept = _drain(slow)
+    assert len(slow_kept) == cap
+    assert slow_kept[-1] == ("token", total - 1, f"id{total - 1}")
+
+
+def test_reconnect_replay_still_delivers_full_offline_tail():
+    """The cap must NOT break the #4633 reconnect-replay contract: a tab that
+    resubscribes after the offline buffer filled still receives the FULL
+    retained offline tail. This holds because the cap equals the offline buffer
+    cap — guarding against the regression where the cap was set too small."""
+    ch = create_stream_channel()
+    n = StreamChannel._OFFLINE_BUFFER_MAXLEN
+    for i in range(n + 100):
+        ch.put_nowait(("token", i, f"id{i}"))
+
+    q, snapshot = ch.subscribe_with_snapshot()
+    assert snapshot["offline_buffered_events"] == n
+    drained = _drain(q)
+    # Full retained tail delivered — the cap matches the offline buffer cap.
+    assert len(drained) == n
+    assert drained[0] == ("token", 100, "id100")  # oldest 100 dropped from buffer
+    assert drained[-1] == ("token", n + 100 - 1, f"id{n + 100 - 1}")
+
+
+def test_unsubscribe_removes_subscriber():
+    """Sanity: after unsubscribe, the queue no longer receives broadcasts."""
+    ch = create_stream_channel()
+    q = ch.subscribe()
+    other = ch.subscribe()  # keep a live audience for the broadcast path
+    ch.unsubscribe(q)
+    ch.put_nowait(("token", 0, "id0"))
+    assert q.empty()
+    assert _drain(other) == [("token", 0, "id0")]