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fix(spawn): make Cursor local mode work on macOS (and any non-Linux OS)#3422

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la14-1 merged 1 commit into
fix/cursor-proxy-local-guardfrom
macos-cursor-local-fix
May 21, 2026
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fix(spawn): make Cursor local mode work on macOS (and any non-Linux OS)#3422
la14-1 merged 1 commit into
fix/cursor-proxy-local-guardfrom
macos-cursor-local-fix

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@aulorbe
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@aulorbe aulorbe commented May 20, 2026

Problem

spawn cursor local fails on macOS with four cascading errors:

chmod: /usr/local/bin/caddy: No such file or directory
bash: line 4: caddy: command not found
bash: /etc/hosts: Permission denied
bash: line 24: setsid: command not found

These occur in packages/cli/src/shared/cursor-proxy.ts (setupCursorProxy and startCursorProxy). Even though local/agents.ts wires runLocal as the runServer callback, the proxy scripts it constructs were written exclusively for Linux:

  1. Caddy downloads the wrong binary — setupCursorProxy calls https://caddyserver.com/api/download?os=linux&arch=amd64 unconditionally. On macOS this downloads a Linux ELF binary that immediately fails to execute.
  2. Caddy install path is root-owned on macOS — the script writes to /usr/local/bin/caddy. On macOS this directory either doesn't exist (no Homebrew) or is owned by a system process, so chmod +x immediately fails without sudo.
  3. /etc/hosts is read-only without root on macOS — the domain-spoofing step runs echo "127.0.0.1 ..." >> /etc/hosts directly, which fails with Permission denied because /etc/hosts is only writable by root on macOS (unlike some Linux setups where the invoking user may own it).
  4. setsid is Linux-only — the non-systemd fallback in startCursorProxy calls setsid to detach backend processes. setsid is a util-linux command; it doesn't ship on macOS (or BSD, or Windows). nohup … & is the portable equivalent.
    The downstream symptom of all four: Caddy never starts, the proxy is never listening, and Cursor's auth exchange fails — which surfaces as "The provided API key is invalid" even when the key is valid.

Fix

  • OS/arch detection — query process.platform and process.arch (already available in Bun) to select the correct Caddy download (os=darwin, arch=arm64 | amd64 for macOS; os=linux for Linux).
  • User-writable install path — install Caddy to ~/.local/bin/caddy (guaranteed writable, always exists after mkdir -p) instead of /usr/local/bin/. Add ~/.local/bin to PATH in the execution environment.
  • sudo for /etc/hosts — prefix the sed and echo host entries with sudo. Wrap in a try/catch with a clear fallback message if sudo isn't available (some sandboxed environments).
  • Replace setsid with nohup — swap setsid $NODE ... for nohup $NODE ... < /dev/null >> /tmp/cursor-proxy.log 2>&1 & in the non-systemd branch. nohup is POSIX and present on macOS, Linux, and BSD.

Affected code

  • packages/cli/src/shared/cursor-proxy.tsinstallCaddy shell fragment, hosts-spoofing fragment, startCursorProxy non-systemd branch
  • No changes to the CloudRunner interface, tests, or other agents

Testing

Tested on macOS (Apple Silicon, M3) with SPAWN_CLI_DIR pointing at a local build:

  • spawn cursor local completes all setup steps without errors
  • Caddy starts on port 443, unary backend on 18644, bidi backend on 18645
  • Cursor authenticates and routes completions through OpenRouter

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aulorbe commented May 20, 2026

Warning

This pull request is not mergeable via GitHub because a downstack PR is open. Once all requirements are satisfied, merge this PR as a stack on Graphite.
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@aulorbe aulorbe changed the title fix(cursor-proxy): macOS local cursor CLI compatibility fix(spawn): make Cursor local mode work on macOS (and any non-Linux OS) May 20, 2026
@aulorbe aulorbe marked this pull request as ready for review May 20, 2026 23:00
@aulorbe aulorbe force-pushed the macos-cursor-local-fix branch from 28ff176 to fe2907d Compare May 20, 2026 23:06
@aulorbe aulorbe changed the base branch from main to graphite-base/3422 May 20, 2026 23:21
@aulorbe aulorbe force-pushed the macos-cursor-local-fix branch from fe2907d to 2a49db3 Compare May 20, 2026 23:21
@aulorbe aulorbe changed the base branch from graphite-base/3422 to fix/cursor-proxy-local-guard May 20, 2026 23:21
@aulorbe aulorbe changed the base branch from fix/cursor-proxy-local-guard to graphite-base/3422 May 20, 2026 23:34
@aulorbe aulorbe force-pushed the graphite-base/3422 branch from 475ef82 to 5f193ec Compare May 20, 2026 23:39
@aulorbe aulorbe force-pushed the macos-cursor-local-fix branch from 2a49db3 to 7290220 Compare May 20, 2026 23:39
@aulorbe aulorbe changed the base branch from graphite-base/3422 to fix/cursor-proxy-local-guard May 20, 2026 23:39
@louisgv louisgv force-pushed the fix/cursor-proxy-local-guard branch from 5f193ec to 4f96dbc Compare May 21, 2026 00:13
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a bit of a weird diff. (?)..

- Detect OS/arch at runtime for cross-platform Caddy installation
- Install Caddy to ~/.local/bin (user-writable on all platforms)
- Fix /etc/hosts configuration to work on both macOS and Linux
- Replace setsid (Linux-only) with nohup (POSIX)
- Ensure ~/.local/bin is in PATH for Caddy commands
- Add comprehensive comments explaining platform-specific choices

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.7 <noreply@anthropic.com>
@louisgv louisgv force-pushed the fix/cursor-proxy-local-guard branch from 4f96dbc to 7a5cf90 Compare May 21, 2026 00:14
@louisgv louisgv force-pushed the macos-cursor-local-fix branch from 7290220 to 08799bd Compare May 21, 2026 00:14
@la14-1 la14-1 merged commit 84e5ef4 into fix/cursor-proxy-local-guard May 21, 2026
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3 participants