Cursor notebook editor does not refresh after Agent edits .ipynb files

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1

Hi everyone,

I have been running into a persistent issue with Jupyter notebooks in Cursor on macOS.

When the Agent edits a .ipynb file, the file appears to be updated correctly on disk, but the notebook editor that is already open in Cursor does not refresh. The new code or changed cells only appear after I close the notebook tab, discard/reload the stale version, and then reopen the file.

This started happening a couple of weeks ago and was working perfectly before. I have already tried reinstalling Cursor, as it makes it basically unusable (having to ask Cursor to save an updated version after every single edit that then I can reload).

Not sure if the same happens to others, workflow wise:

  1. I open a Jupyter notebook in Cursor,

  2. I ask the Agent to modify the notebook, for example by adding or changing code cells.

  3. The Agent reports that the notebook file has been updated.

  4. The open notebook view in Cursor does not show the new or modified cells. If I run the loaded notebook, it is indeed the old version, so e.g. bug fixed that Cursor’s Agents did, are not loaded.

  5. If I close the notebook, discard the stale open version, and reopen the same file, the changes are visible and can actually be run.

This seems specific to only the rendered notebooks. If I close and reopen the file, the changes are there. With other files, it also seems to work. So the problem seems to be the notebook editor cache/refresh etc., rather than the Agent failing to edit the file. Just in case it’s relevant, the files are within dropbox, but offline and just synced…

Is there a setting or workaround to force notebook tabs to reload when the underlying .ipynb file change?

Thanks so much!

5

Hey, thanks for the detailed report. The symptom makes sense.

This case is different from similar notebook threads. Those are about a bug where raw JSON shows up in the Review or diff view, and the workaround switch to the .ipynb tab fixes it. In your case, the notebook tab itself is not picking up changes from disk. That is a different issue, and we do not have a specific ticket for it yet.

To log this properly, a few quick questions:

  1. Your Cursor version. Go to Help > About and paste the full block.
  2. If you can, try to reproduce outside your Dropbox folder. Just copy the notebook to a local folder and repeat the steps. Dropbox sync can interfere with the file watcher, so I want to separate that from the core issue.
  3. When the editor shows the stale version, open the command palette with Cmd+Shift+P and run Revert File. Does that pull in the latest content without closing the tab?

Once you send that over, I will file a bug with solid details. I cannot promise an ETA yet, but without a reproducible report it is harder to prioritize.