Hey, point by point.
Your rule with alwaysApply: false plus globs: python3/** is for Apply to Specific Files mode, docs Rules | Cursor Docs. The idea is that the agent should pick it up when there is a file in context that matches the glob. In practice, glob-scoped rules are being picked up unreliably right now, and we’ve seen quite a few similar reports over the last couple of months:
- Glob pattern rules are never respected by agent
- Cursor rules not getting applied
- `alwaysApply: true` rules are being completely ignored now
We’re tracking the issue, but I can’t share an ETA for a fix yet.
About how to check if a rule was actually used, there isn’t a reliable indicator in the UI right now. There’s an open feature request for that, Show which rules are injected into prompts, feel free to subscribe and upvote.
Workarounds that tend to be more reliable:
- Set
alwaysApply: truefor critical rules like style, function limits, etc, so the rule content is guaranteed to go into the system prompt. - Or manually @ mention the rule in chat when you’re working on that topic.
One more note: even when a rule is injected, different models handle rules differently. Some will mention a conflict like this goes against your rule, should I do it anyway. Others will just follow the request. So it’s still best to do a quick final check of the output yourself.