I am trying to use cursor glass on remote servers with dev containers. I get “Extension ‘Dev Containers’ is required to open the remote window.
Do you want to install the extension?” but after reloading I still get the same error.
Steps to Reproduce
connect to remote server via ssh in cursor glass
attempt to connect to existing dev container workspace
pop up shows up
trying to install the extension does nothing
Note I am on MacOS but remote server is Linux
Expected Behavior
I want dev containers to show up as separate workspaces so that I can have separate dev containers on the same remote isolated with their own dev servers etc
This is a known limitation in Glass Alpha. Remote connection types like Dev Containers and WSL aren’t fully supported in Glass yet. The prompt you’re seeing loops because the extension can’t actually activate in the Glass environment, even after installation.
For now, you can work around this by opening Cursor in classic mode:
cursor --classic
You can also use the “Open Editor Window” command from within Glass, which opens a classic-mode window where Dev Containers work as expected.
The team is actively building out remote support in Glass, starting with SSH. I don’t have a specific timeline for Dev Container support, but your report helps prioritize it.
Hi Mohit - is there a feature request I should be tracking to know when cursor 3 will support dev containers. It looks amazing but is pretty unworkable for me at the moment as we have a lot of tooling built around dev containers so the agents are pretty limited without them.
Agent view always notify “‘dev container’ is required to open remote window.do you want to install the extension” , after click " install and reload ". The notification appears again. Project not use dev container works well.
Steps to Reproduce
1、Project is on the remote linux server. System:Ubuntu 22.04.5 LTS.
2、Use devcontainer to develop.
3、Open agent view，click the project, the notification appeared.
Dev container support is a hard blocker for us to migrate to the new UI. Our team relies on dev containers heavily for our development workflow, so until that’s supported we’re stuck on the current UI. Hope this is on the roadmap. Thank you!
Good point about the prompt — agreed it should communicate the limitation clearly rather than suggesting an install that won’t resolve it. I’ve flagged that with the team.
There’s no specific public feature request to track right now. The best place to watch for updates is the Cursor changelog — when Dev Container support lands in Glass, it’ll be announced there. In the meantime, the team is aware this is a blocker for dev container-heavy workflows like yours, and reports like this help with prioritization.
I am unable to use the agent window on a remote container. When I try to, a popup appears and tells me to install the Dev Containers extension and restart. This extension is already installed. If i click on the ‘Install and Restart’ button in the pop up, the agent window does restart but the popup appears again - still unable to connect to the remote.
Steps to Reproduce
Open a workspace on a docker container, using the anyspere dev containers extension. Then, open the agents window.
Expected Behavior
I expect the agents window to be able to connect to the remote container
This is a known limitation in the agent window. Dev Containers aren’t supported there yet – only SSH remotes are. The install prompt loops because the extension gets filtered out after installation, so the prompt just keeps reappearing.
Two workarounds for now:
Classic mode: Launch Cursor with cursor --classic to get full devcontainer support
Open Editor Window: From inside the agent window, use the “Open Editor Window” command to open a classic-mode window where Dev Containers work normally
Other users have reported the same behavior in this thread. The team is aware this is a blocker for devcontainer-heavy workflows. Remote support in the agent window started with SSH, and Dev Containers is next, though there’s no specific ETA.
I had the same problem and spent 4 hours trying to get DevContainer to work in Glass. I even reinstalled everything. You really should communicate better when something isn’t supported yet. That would have saved me a lot of time and hassle. I hope you make this a priority. I imagine a lot of people use DevContainer for development.
Hey! Dev Container support in the Agents Window is still on the roadmap — the team is aware it’s a blocker for devcontainer-heavy workflows. No ETA yet, but it’s actively being tracked. For now, cursor --classic or the “Open Editor Window” command from within the Agents Window are the best workarounds. I’ll update here when there’s progress.
may be useful to have the tooltip indicate that instead of prompting for an action that won’t fix it!