I can't run background agents

Where does the bug appear (feature/product)?

Background Agent (GitHub, Slack, Web, Linear)

Describe the Bug

I can’t run background agents. every few weeks i try and it just never works always fails.

Steps to Reproduce

I literally send any message to a background agent and it always fails.

Expected Behavior

For the background agent to run

Operating System

MacOS

Version Information

Version: 2.4.31 (Universal)
VSCode Version: 1.105.1
Commit: 3578107fdf149b00059ddad37048220e41681000
Date: 2026-02-08T07:42:24.999Z (4 days ago)
Build Type: Stable
Release Track: Default
Electron: 39.2.7
Chromium: 142.0.7444.235
Node.js: 22.21.1
V8: 14.2.231.21-electron.0
OS: Darwin arm64 25.2.0

For AI issues: which model did you use?

Gpt 5.3 codex

For AI issues: add Request ID with privacy disabled

cant find a request id but heres the url:
https://cursor.com/agents/bc-1abac97e-3cc1-4f5c-b2bd-834a4c3c4716

Additional Information

the error it runs into:

Internal Error: EACCES: permission denied, symlink ‘../lib/node_modules/corepack/dist/pnpm.js’ → ‘/usr/local/bin/pnpm’ at async Object.symlink (node:internal/fs/promises:994:10) at async EnableCommand.generatePosixLink (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/corepack/dist/lib/corepack.cjs:23161:5) at async Promise.all (index 0) at async EnableCommand.execute (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/corepack/dist/lib/corepack.cjs:23144:5) at async EnableCommand.validateAndExecute (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/corepack/dist/lib/corepack.cjs:20250:22) at async _Cli.run (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/corepack/dist/lib/corepack.cjs:21187:18) at async Object.runMain (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/corepack/dist/lib/corepack.cjs:23647:19) ERROR: process “/bin/sh -c corepack enable && corepack prepare yarn@stable --activate” did not complete successfully: exit code: 1 Internal Error: EACCES: permission denied, symlink ‘../lib/node_modules/corepack/dist/pnpm.js’ → ‘/usr/local/bin/pnpm’ at async Object.symlink (node:internal/fs/promises:994:10) at async EnableCommand.generatePosixLink (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/corepack/dist/lib/corepack.cjs:23161:5) at async Promise.all (index 0) at async EnableCommand.execute (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/corepack/dist/lib/corepack.cjs:23144:5) at async EnableCommand.validateAndExecute (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/corepack/dist/lib/corepack.cjs:20250:22) at async _Cli.run (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/corepack/dist/lib/corepack.cjs:21187:18) at async Object.runMain (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/corepack/dist/lib/corepack.cjs:23647:19) ERROR: process “/bin/sh -c corepack enable && corepack prepare yarn@stable --activate” did not complete successfully: exit code: 1 Internal Error: EACCES: permission denied, symlink ‘../lib/node_modules/corepack/dist/pnpm.js’ → ‘/usr/local/bin/pnpm’ at async Object.symlink (node:internal/fs/promises:994:10) at async EnableCommand.generatePosixLink (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/corepack/dist/lib/corepack.cjs:23161:5) at async Promise.all (index 0) at async EnableCommand.execute (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/corepack/dist/lib/corepack.cjs:23144:5) at async EnableCommand.validateAndExecute (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/corepack/dist/lib/corepack.cjs:20250:22) at async _Cli.run (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/corepack/dist/lib/corepack.cjs:21187:18) at async Object.runMain (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/corepack/dist/lib/corepack.cjs:23647:19) ERROR: process “/bin/sh -c corepack enable && corepack prepare yarn@stable --activate” did not complete successfully: exit code: 1

Does this stop you from using Cursor

Sometimes - I can sometimes use Cursor