Image tools: work around OWUI 0.9.x files-event regression

Open WebUI 0.9.0 introduced chat-history virtualization that
unmounts off-screen assistant messages and reconstructs them from
persisted shape; `files` attached mid-stream by a tool don't
survive the round-trip — the image flashes in during streaming
and disappears the moment the message commits.

Both image tools now upload via Open WebUI's file store as before
but surface the result as a markdown image injected into the
assistant message via a `message` event, which is part of the
persisted shape and renders reliably across remounts. Trade-off:
loses the file-attachment chrome (thumbnail + download button).
Each tool has a TODO marking the swap site with the original
`files` payload inlined for one-line revert once upstream fixes
the regression.

smart_image_gen.py 0.7.8 -> 0.7.9
smart_image_pipe.py 0.1.0 -> 0.1.1

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.7 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>

deployments/ai-stack/openwebui-tools/smart_image_gen.py

@@ -1,7 +1,7 @@
 """
 title: Smart Image Generator & Editor (ComfyUI)
 author: ai-stack
-version: 0.7.8
+version: 0.7.9
 description: Generate or edit images via ComfyUI with automatic SDXL
     checkpoint routing. Two methods — generate_image (txt2img) and
     edit_image (img2img on the user's most recently attached image). The
@@ -9,8 +9,8 @@ description: Generate or edit images via ComfyUI with automatic SDXL
     score-tag, NoobAI/Illustrious furry, etc. — and each style ships
     with the creator-recommended sampler, scheduler, CFG, steps, CLIP
     skip, prompt-prefix dialect, and negatives. The image is uploaded
-    to Open WebUI's file store and surfaced via a `files` event (the
-    canonical pattern used by Open WebUI's own image-gen path); the
+    to Open WebUI's file store and surfaced as a markdown image
+    appended to the assistant message via a `message` event; the
     function return is a short confirmation so the LLM doesn't try to
     describe or re-emit the image.
 required_open_webui_version: 0.5.0
@@ -586,14 +586,22 @@ async def _push_image_to_chat(
     event_emitter: Optional[Callable[[dict], Awaitable[None]]],
 ) -> bool:
     """
-    Surface a generated image in the chat using Open WebUI's canonical
-    pattern: upload the bytes via the internal file store, then emit a
-    `files` event referencing the served URL. This is the same path Open
-    WebUI's own image-generation code uses (utils/middleware.py ~1325).
+    Surface a generated image in the chat: upload the bytes via the
+    internal file store, then inject a markdown image referencing the
+    served URL into the assistant message via a `message` event.
 
-    Returns True if the image was uploaded and emitted via the files
-    event. Returns False if anything is missing — caller should fall
-    back to a data-URI markdown message in that case.
+    We deliberately don't use the `files` event (Open WebUI's own
+    image-gen path). Open WebUI 0.9.x added chat-history virtualization
+    that unmounts off-screen messages and reconstructs them from
+    persisted shape — and `files` attached to an assistant message
+    mid-stream by a tool don't survive that round-trip. The image
+    flashes in during streaming and disappears the moment the message
+    commits. Markdown in `message.content` is part of the persisted
+    shape, so it renders reliably on every remount.
+
+    Returns True if the image was uploaded and emitted. Returns False
+    if anything is missing — caller falls back to a data-URI markdown
+    message (same `message` event path, just inline bytes).
     """
     if not (_OPENWEBUI_RUNTIME and request and user_dict and event_emitter):
         return False
@@ -630,9 +638,23 @@ async def _push_image_to_chat(
             "get_file_content_by_id", id=file_item.id
         )
 
+        # TODO(open-webui virtualization fix): once chat-history
+        # virtualization survives `files` events from tool calls again,
+        # swap back to the `files` payload below. The `files` event
+        # gives proper file-attachment chrome (thumbnail card + download
+        # button) that the markdown-image path lacks. Verify the fix by
+        # emitting `files`, then refreshing the page AND scrolling the
+        # message off-screen and back — both must keep the image
+        # visible. Track upstream: github.com/open-webui/open-webui
+        # release notes mentioning tool calls, `files` events, or
+        # virtualization. To restore, replace the block below with:
+        #     await event_emitter({
+        #         "type": "files",
+        #         "data": {"files": [{"type": "image", "url": url}]},
+        #     })
         await event_emitter({
-            "type": "files",
-            "data": {"files": [{"type": "image", "url": url}]},
+            "type": "message",
+            "data": {"content": f"\n![{filename_prefix}]({url})\n"},
         })
         return True
     except Exception:

deployments/ai-stack/openwebui-tools/smart_image_pipe.py

@@ -1,7 +1,7 @@
 """
 title: Smart Image Studio (Pipe)
 author: ai-stack
-version: 0.1.0
+version: 0.1.1
 description: Deterministic image-gen / edit / inpaint pipe — no LLM in the
     loop for the routing decision. Registers as a model in the chat-model
     dropdown ('Image Studio (Pipe)'). Reads the user's message + attached
@@ -420,9 +420,23 @@ async def _push_image_to_chat(raw, prefix, request, user_dict, metadata, event_e
         )
         file_item = await result if inspect.iscoroutine(result) else result
         url = request.app.url_path_for("get_file_content_by_id", id=file_item.id)
+        # TODO(open-webui virtualization fix): once chat-history
+        # virtualization survives `files` events from tool calls again,
+        # swap back to the `files` payload below. The `files` event
+        # gives proper file-attachment chrome (thumbnail card + download
+        # button) that the markdown-image path lacks. Verify the fix by
+        # emitting `files`, then refreshing the page AND scrolling the
+        # message off-screen and back — both must keep the image
+        # visible. Track upstream: github.com/open-webui/open-webui
+        # release notes mentioning tool calls, `files` events, or
+        # virtualization. To restore, replace the block below with:
+        #     await event_emitter({
+        #         "type": "files",
+        #         "data": {"files": [{"type": "image", "url": url}]},
+        #     })
         await event_emitter({
-            "type": "files",
-            "data": {"files": [{"type": "image", "url": url}]},
+            "type": "message",
+            "data": {"content": f"\n![{prefix}]({url})\n"},
         })
         return True
     except Exception: