feat(web): reply to selected assistant text

[piyushpradhan]

What Changed

• Adds a contextual Reply action when text is selected inside an assistant response.
• Inserts the selected passage into the composer as an editable Markdown quote.
• Documents the web/desktop interaction and the mobile display behavior.

Why

Replying to one passage currently requires manually copying, pasting, and formatting it. This keeps the selected context visible in chat history and sends it through the existing provider flow without changing wire contracts or provider adapters.

Closes #6456

UI Changes

Before — selecting assistant text has no follow-up action:

After — the selection exposes a compact Reply action:

Choosing Reply inserts an editable quote into the composer:

Checklist

• I tested the change locally
• I included tests for new behavior
• I updated documentation where applicable
• I did not include unrelated changes

Generated by GPT-5.6-Sol via the Codex harness in T3 Code.

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Note

Low Risk
Client-only composer/timeline UX with unit tests; no API or provider contract changes.

Overview
Adds Reply when you select text in an assistant message on web/desktop. A floating button uses the same clipboard payload as copy, then appends a labeled markdown blockquote to the composer via new helpers in assistantResponseQuote.ts (spacing rules avoid extra blank lines).

ChatView wires the callback; if the composer can’t accept text (e.g. active request), users see a “Reply unavailable” toast. CSS animates the action chip with reduced-motion support. docs/user/chat.md documents the flow and notes mobile can show quotes but not create them yet.

^{Reviewed by Cursor Bugbot for commit f3ae1c9. Bugbot is set up for automated code reviews on this repo. Configure here.}

Note

Add floating Reply button for selected assistant message text in chat

• Selecting text within an assistant message now shows a floating Reply button; clicking it inserts a formatted markdown quote block into the composer.
• The quote is formatted by assistantResponseQuote.ts: each line is prefixed with >, preceded by a bold > **Replying to an assistant response:** header, and separated from existing composer content by the appropriate number of newlines.
• If the composer is unavailable or busy (e.g. a request is in flight), an info toast is shown instead of inserting.
• The floating button is styled in index.css with an entry animation that respects prefers-reduced-motion.
• User documentation is added in docs/user/chat.md, noting that reply creation is web/desktop only while mobile can display quotes.

^{Macroscope summarized f3ae1c9.}

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[macroscopeapp]

Approvability

Verdict: Needs human review

This PR introduces a new user-facing feature (selecting assistant text to create quoted replies) with new UI components, event handlers, and workflows. New capabilities of this scope warrant human review regardless of implementation quality.

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Cursor Bugbot has reviewed your changes using high effort and found 1 potential issue.

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[t3dotgg]

Note

🤖 GPT-6 Astra (preview) responding on behalf of Theo

This was closed as part of an automated cleanup pass. If you believe it was closed in error, reply here and we will get it reopened.

Closing as superseded by #9146, which is on main. Selecting assistant text now offers Cite and adds the selection to the composer with a source link. That flow also supports saved drafts and source navigation, so a second Reply overlay for the same selection is not needed.