Keep the panel node-pack in sync with the orchestrator

The orchestrator (comfyui-mcp, from npm) and the sidebar panel (comfyui-agent-panel on the Comfy Registry, repo comfyui-mcp-panel) ship separately. Updating one does not update the other. A new orchestrator driving an old panel fails in confusing ways, such as a bridge command the panel doesn't implement or a feature that exists in the docs but not in the sidebar, and those failures are hard for a user to diagnose. This skill closes that gap.

The two rules that outrank everything else here

1. Never report a sync that did not happen. This whole feature sits on top of the fabricate-success fixes (#639/#641): ComfyUI-Manager reports its queue "drained" even when it never enqueued anything, and a .bak-style copy in custom_nodes can shadow the real panel in the browser. So the only version you may ever tell the user is the one read back from disk after the fact. If the tool throws, the sync FAILED. Say so plainly. Do not soften it, do not retry it into a success, do not report the version you intended to install.

2. Never move a pinned user. A pin is a promise. If the user pinned the panel, you warn and stop. You do not unpin for them, you do not "just this once", you do not sync anyway because the new version is obviously better. Offer to clear the pin, and act only if they say yes.

Step 1 — Look before you touch anything

install_comfyui(action:'panel', panel_action:'status')

This never errors. Read these fields:

Field	Meaning
installedVersion	The panel version on disk (from its pyproject.toml).
sync.requiredPanelVersion	The highest panel version this orchestrator build needs.
sync.decision	What to do — the whole decision is made for you (Step 2).
sync.summary	Plain-language explanation, safe to paraphrase to the user.
pin	The active pin: { pinned, version, source: "env"|"settings", reason }.
shadows	.bak-style copies that shadow the real panel in the browser.
isDevSymlink	A developer's symlinked checkout — never ours to modify.

Do not compute the comparison yourself. sync.decision already accounts for the pin, shadow copies, dev symlinks, remote/cloud mode, and unreadable versions.

Step 2 — Act on sync.decision

decision	What it means	What you do
meets-floor	Panel clears the minimum the orchestrator needs. It is not a statement that a newer panel does not exist — nothing on this path knows the newest published version, and most panel fixes ship without raising the floor (#806).	Nothing, unless the user is chasing a bug. Say "meets the minimum (X ≥ Y)", never "up to date". If they are debugging, add that a newer panel may carry the fix and that the latest is published in the pack's pyproject.toml.
sync	Behind, not pinned, nothing ambiguous.	Step 3 — sync it.
pinned-warn	Behind, but pinned.	Step 4 — warn only. Do not sync.
blocked	A shadow copy, or a pin we couldn't read.	Step 5 — get it unblocked first.
unknown	The installed version isn't comparable (nightly, dev, unreadable) and nothing is pinned.	Report it, don't guess. Offer a deliberate install_comfyui(action:'panel', panel_action:'update') and let the user decide. (If they were pinned you'd have got pinned-warn instead, so unknown never means "quietly ignore a pin".)
dev-install	Symlinked dev checkout.	Tell them to git pull their own checkout. Change nothing.
not-applicable	Remote/cloud, or no local ComfyUI.	Explain the panel is managed on the ComfyUI host.

Step 3 — Sync (decision: "sync")

install_comfyui(action:'panel', panel_action:'sync')

That single call re-checks the decision at execution time (the pin may have been set a second ago), runs the update through the hardened, verified path, and re-reads the pack from disk afterwards. Read the result:

• synced: true → it moved. Report verifiedVersion, the version observed on disk after the op, not the one we asked for. Then tell the user ComfyUI must be RESTARTED to load it (restartRequired: true); this never auto-restarts. Now read stillBehind, which is tri-state:
  • false → the panel provably meets what the orchestrator needs. Done.
  • true → the update applied but did not close the gap. Say so; do not round it up to "you're current now".
  • null → it landed, but the resulting version (e.g. nightly) can't be compared, so whether the mismatch is fixed is unknown. Say exactly that. null is not false. Never report it as "you're fine".
• synced: false → nothing was changed. decision says why (pinned-warn, meets-floor, blocked, …). This is a normal outcome, not a failure.
• The tool errored → the sync FAILED. The error text names the cause (ComfyUI-Manager's stale-3.x silent no-op, a shadow copy, an unverifiable post-state) and the fix. Relay it. Never describe a failed sync as "completed with warnings" or "probably fine after a restart".

For a user who is on Comfy Desktop, restart via the Manager reboot endpoint rather than killing the process.

Step 4 — Pinned (decision: "pinned-warn") — WARN, DO NOT SYNC

The user deliberately held the panel where it is. Tell them three things and then stop:

1. A newer panel that matches their orchestrator exists (requiredPanelVersion).
2. They are pinned (say to what, and where the pin lives, from pin.source).
3. How to get off it, if they want to.

Your orchestrator (comfyui-mcp 0.48.32) expects panel 0.11.28+, and you're on 0.11.3. You've pinned the panel to 0.11.3, so I haven't changed anything. Want me to clear the pin and update? I'd unpin and then sync; ComfyUI needs a restart afterwards.

Only if they say yes:

install_comfyui(action:'panel', panel_action:'unpin')      # clears the persisted pin
install_comfyui(action:'panel', panel_action:'sync')       # then Step 3

If pin.source is "env", unpin cannot clear it, because the pin comes from the COMFYUI_MCP_PANEL_PIN environment variable. Tell the user to unset it (or set it to off) in their environment or ~/.comfyui-mcp/.env and restart the orchestrator. Do not edit their environment for them, and do not report them as unpinned. install_comfyui(action:'panel', panel_action:'unpin') returns the still-active pin in that case, and its note says exactly this.

Step 5 — Blocked

• Shadow copy (shadows non-empty): a dir like .comfyui-agent-panel.bak-0.11.28 in custom_nodes is also served as a web extension, and a dot-prefixed name wins by sort order, so the browser may be loading the old panel no matter what the disk says. Nothing can be verified until it's gone. Tell the user to move it out of custom_nodes (not only rename it) and hard-refresh the ComfyUI tab, then re-run Step 1.
• Unreadable pin: ~/.comfyui-mcp/panel-settings.json exists but couldn't be parsed, so we cannot prove the user isn't pinned, and we refuse to move them on a guess. Ask them to fix or delete that file (or set COMFYUI_MCP_PANEL_PIN=off), then re-run Step 1.

Pinning on request

If the user wants to stay on their current panel (they're mid-project, a newer panel regressed something, they're testing):

install_comfyui(action:'panel')(action='pin', version='<installedVersion from status>', reason='<why>')

version is required. Never invent one. Pass the installedVersion from Step 1 to pin them where they already are. A pin records intent only. It does not change what is installed.

While it's set, everything that could move the panel refuses, not only install_comfyui(action:'panel'). The panel is an ordinary custom node pack, so the generic node tools are a second door into the same operation, and they are guarded too:

• install_custom_node / install_custom_node (action: "update") / install_custom_node (action: "reinstall") targeting the panel by any spelling: the registry id, the repo name, or a git URL including ref-carrying forms like …/comfyui-mcp-panel.git@v0.11.28 and …/comfyui-mcp-panel/tree/main. These also route through the verified path automatically, so the version they report is re-read from disk like sync's.
• id="all", and install_comfyui (action:"update_all"). A bulk update moves the panel along with everything else. ComfyUI-Manager can't update everything-except-one-pack, so while pinned these refuse outright. If the user wants the rest updated, either unpin first or update the other packs individually by id. Say that plainly rather than quietly unpinning to make all work.
• install_custom_node (action: "fix"), panel_install_node and panel_update_node refuse a panel target outright, pinned or not. They report success as soon as the ComfyUI-Manager queue drains, which proves nothing, and there's no verified equivalent to route them into. Use install_comfyui(action:'panel') instead; don't work around the refusal.

Prefer install_comfyui(action:'panel') throughout. It's the one with status, sync and the pin.

When to run this at all

• Right after the orchestrator updates (install_comfyui (action:"self_update"), a fresh npm i -g, or a version in the ENVIRONMENT line that's newer than last you saw).
• When a panel/bridge command fails in a way that smells like version drift: "panel is too old", a graph_*/ui_* command the panel doesn't implement, a documented sidebar feature that isn't there.
• Whenever the user asks to update, pin, or unpin the panel.

Be proportionate. This is a one-line check. If decision is meets-floor and the user didn't ask, don't narrate it. Carry on with what they wanted. The exception is a user who is DEBUGGING the panel. meets-floor is exactly the state that hides a shipped fix behind an unchanged floor, so there it is worth the sentence.

Absolute rules

• A sync that didn't move bytes is a FAILURE. Report the thrown error, never a success.
• Report verifiedVersion (re-read from disk), never the target version, never nightly.
• A pin is never overridden, not even "temporarily". Unpin requires the user's explicit yes.
• Never touch a dev symlink. It's someone's working repo.
• Always say a restart is required after a sync lands; nothing here auto-restarts ComfyUI.

Sources

• Official: comfyui-mcp panel product behavior (this repo).
• Empirical: sync/mismatch recipes from observed panel vs disk drift.