restart_gateway

What restart_gateway does on LocalAnt

AI agents invoke restart_gateway to trigger actions in LocalAnt. What it does depends on the arguments the agent supplies, and its effects often reach beyond the immediate call: builds kicked off, notifications sent, workflows started.

Why restart_gateway is rated High

This tool executes a system-level operation—restarting/reloading the gateway—which is an irreversible action affecting the running service. While not directly destructive to data, it disrupts the availability and control plane of the entire LocalAnt system, making it Execute rather than Write. An AI agent invoking this without explicit user intent could cause service interruption.

From the tool's definition Tool name is 'restart_gateway' with description 'Reload configuration into the running gateway.' This triggers an external operation (gateway restart/reload) that cannot be precisely predicted without knowing the full configuration context.

The rule that runs restart_gateway safely

PolicyLayer is an MCP gateway: it sits between your AI agents and LocalAnt, and checks every tool call against a rule you set before the call runs. Nothing changes on the server itself. For restart_gateway, this is the rule to start with:

{
  "version": "1",
  "default": "deny",
  "tools": {
    "restart_gateway": {
      "limits": [
        {
          "counter": "restart_gateway_rate",
          "window": "minute",
          "max": 10,
          "scope": "grant"
        }
      ]
    }
  }
}

Questions about restart_gateway