Devcontainers don't work yet again

Where does the bug appear (feature/product)?

Cursor IDE

Describe the Bug

Once again Cursor’s devcontainer support is not working. I can’t open workspace using devcontainers. The workspace in question works just fine when using VS Code, or running the exact build command Cursor uses from the command line.

I’m getting following error which I had to spot using QuickTime Screen Recording functionality because Cursor conveniently hides the error almost immediately it is produced. My PATH includes /usr/local/bin (I’m starting Cursor using the app icon on Mac OS, instead of starting it from the command line, though). I’m running a standard Mac OS and Docker Desktop installation.

For similar reasons, I’ve previously had to configure "dev.containers.dockerPath": "/usr/local/bin/docker". Unfortunately I can’t find similar configuration option for docker-credential-desktop.

I wish you would have some kind of quality control to prevent devcontainers breaking almost every week, rendering Cursor practically unusable.

Here is the error:

failed to solve: error getting credentials - err: exec: "docker-credential-desktop": executable file not found in $PATH, out: ``

Some additional logs:

2025-12-18 10:01:59.908 [error] [devcontainer run-user-commands][stderr JSON parse error]: Error: Command failed: /usr/local/bin/docker compose --project-name x -f /x/.devcontainer/docker-compose.yml -f /var/folders/tk/b5v9_lvn7q9gd9dpj3tg3svw0000gn/T/devcontainercli/docker-compose/docker-compose.devcontainer.build-1766044919061.yml build --no-cache
2025-12-18 10:01:59.908 [error] [devcontainer run-user-commands][stderr JSON parse error]:     at lw (/path/to/home/.cursor/extensions/anysphere.remote-containers-1.0.29/dist/@devcontainers/cli/dist/spec-node/devContainersSpecCLI.js:2:1573026)
2025-12-18 10:01:59.908 [error] [devcontainer run-user-commands][stderr JSON parse error]:     at async l6 (/path/to/home/.cursor/extensions/anysphere.remote-containers-1.0.29/dist/@devcontainers/cli/dist/spec-node/devContainersSpecCLI.js:2:1574975)
2025-12-18 10:01:59.908 [error] [devcontainer run-user-commands][stderr JSON parse error]:     at async c6 (/path/to/home/.cursor/extensions/anysphere.remote-containers-1.0.29/dist/@devcontainers/cli/dist/spec-node/devContainersSpecCLI.js:2:1569359)
2025-12-18 10:01:59.908 [error] [devcontainer run-user-commands][stderr JSON parse error]:     at async Y6 (/path/to/home/.cursor/extensions/anysphere.remote-containers-1.0.29/dist/@devcontainers/cli/dist/spec-node/devContainersSpecCLI.js:2:1599153)
2025-12-18 10:01:59.908 [error] [devcontainer run-user-commands][stderr JSON parse error]:     at async BC (/path/to/home/.cursor/extensions/anysphere.remote-containers-1.0.29/dist/@devcontainers/cli/dist/spec-node/devContainersSpecCLI.js:2:1599941)
2025-12-18 10:01:59.908 [error] [devcontainer run-user-commands][stderr JSON parse error]:     at async p7 (/path/to/home/.cursor/extensions/anysphere.remote-containers-1.0.29/dist/@devcontainers/cli/dist/spec-node/devContainersSpecCLI.js:2:1673382)
2025-12-18 10:01:59.908 [error] [devcontainer run-user-commands][stderr JSON parse error]:     at async d7 (/path/to/home/.cursor/extensions/anysphere.remote-containers-1.0.29/dist/@devcontainers/cli/dist/spec-node/devContainersSpecCLI.js:2:1673046)
2025-12-18 10:01:59.908 [error] [devcontainer run-user-commands][stderr JSON parse error]:     at async /path/to/home/.cursor/extensions/anysphere.remote-containers-1.0.29/dist/@devcontainers/cli/dist/spec-node/devContainersSpecCLI.js:2:1596193
2025-12-18 10:01:59.908 [info] [devcontainer run-user-commands][stdout]: {"outcome":"error","message":"Command failed: /usr/local/bin/docker compose --project-name x -f /x/.devcontainer/docker-compose.yml -f /var/folders/tk/b5v9_lvn7q9gd9dpj3tg3svw0000gn/T/devcontainercli/docker-compose/docker-compose.devcontainer.build-1766044919061.yml build --no-cache","description":"An error occurred building the Docker Compose images."}

2025-12-18 10:01:59.913 [info] [devcontainer run-user-commands][exit]: {"status":1}
2025-12-18 10:01:59.914 [error] Error resolving dev container authority Failed to run devcontainer command: 1. {"outcome":"error","message":"Command failed: /usr/local/bin/docker compose --project-name x -f /x/.devcontainer/docker-compose.yml -f /var/folders/tk/b5v9_lvn7q9gd9dpj3tg3svw0000gn/T/devcontainercli/docker-compose/docker-compose.devcontainer.build-1766044919061.yml build --no-cache","description":"An error occurred building the Docker Compose images."}

Steps to Reproduce

Try to start a workspace with a devcontainer using Cursor.

Expected Behavior

Cursor opens the workspace inside a devcontainer without crashing.

Operating System

MacOS

Current Cursor Version (Menu → About Cursor → Copy)

Version: 2.2.36 (Universal)
VSCode Version: 1.105.1
Commit: 55c9bc11e99cedd1fb93fbb7996abf779c583150
Date: 2025-12-18T06:25:21.733Z
Electron: 37.7.0
Chromium: 138.0.7204.251
Node.js: 22.20.0
V8: 13.8.258.32-electron.0
OS: Darwin arm64 25.2.0

Does this stop you from using Cursor

Yes - Cursor is unusable

Could you share your devcontainer and docker compose file, so we can take a closer look?

Hi,

Unfortunately it is not possible as they contain sensitive information. However, I can tell that it is any line in my Dockerfile where I’m pulling images from outside that are causing failures.

At first it was this:

COPY --from=ghcr.io/astral-sh/uv:0.9.18 ...

After I decided to rebuild the devcontainer without caching previous layers, it was the first line in the Dockerfile:

FROM ubuntu:26.04 ...

If you read the error from my original post, you can see that the reason is Cursor’s inability to find docker-credential-desktop binary which is installed into the standard /usr/local/bin.

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