STUPID-2026-0139

Cline's ask_question composer silently drops image and file attachments, keeping only the typed text

2.8low
October 9, 2026VerifiedReproducible

  1. Instruction given

    During a VS Code task where Cline paused on an `ask_question` prompt (for example, asking the user to confirm a reference design), the user answered by typing text ("Use this screenshot") and attaching an image or file, then submitted.

  2. Expected behavior

    The answer's text should remain the recorded response, the attached images should stay visible to the next model request, attached files should be loaded through Cline's existing file-content handling with their paths and contents included, and the transcript should show one user response carrying both the text and the attachments.

  3. Actual behavior

    Only the typed text reached the model. The attached images and files never arrived — an attachment-only answer (no typed text) resolved as an empty string. The VS Code composer cleared the attachments from the UI after submission, and they did not appear in the recorded answer. The pending question resolved and the task continued as if the answer had been fully provided, with no error or warning surfaced to the user. The reporter traced the cause to two code paths: `sdk-followup-coordinator.ts` passed only the prompt string to the pending-question resolver, and `sdk-interaction-coordinator.ts` resolved the question with a text-only string and built a text-only feedback message, discarding the images and files at both points.

  4. Damage

    No data loss reported. The cost is that the agent proceeded with incomplete information it believed was complete — a user pointing it at a screenshot or reference file had that context silently discarded, which could cause the agent to re-ask for the reference or make decisions without it, with nothing in the transcript indicating anything was dropped. A Cline contributor (mkondratek) acknowledged the gap on 2026-10-12 and confirmed the team would address it. The reporter (dakjdakd) submitted a fix in PR #14986, citing passing VS Code, Core, and SDK test suites; mkondratek merged it and closed the issue as completed on 2026-10-13, four days after it was filed.

A Cline user (dakjdakd), running VS Code extension v4.1.23, reported that answering a pending SDK `ask_question` with both text and attachments silently drops the attachments — only the text reaches the model. The issue gave five reproduction steps (start a task needing a clarifying choice, wait for `ask_question` to display, type a response and attach an image or file, submit, then inspect the recorded feedback and the next model input) plus a deterministic test case registering a question with `SdkInteractionCoordinator.handleAskQuestion` and resolving it through `SdkFollowupCoordinator.askResponse(prompt, images, files)`. The task resumed and the transcript showed a fully-answered question even though the images and files never reached the model, with no error surfaced. The reporter identified the root cause as two coordinator functions that pass or resolve only the prompt text, dropping the structured attachments entirely, and proposed routing the response through Cline's existing runtime-steer path so attachments are enqueued before the question resolves. Cline contributor mkondratek acknowledged the bug on 2026-10-12 and confirmed a fix was coming; the reporter's own PR #14986 (231 passing VS Code tests, 152 passing Core tests, a passing SDK typecheck) was merged and the issue closed as completed on 2026-10-13.

Classification

Agent
Cline
Failure mode
Logic Error
Root cause
Logic Error
Domain
Other
Source
Github Issue

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