Recent update's sandbox feature breaks cursor on multi-user machines

Support Bug Reports
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1

Where does the bug appear (feature/product)?

Cursor IDE

Describe the Bug

When working on a Rust project, Cursor seems to set some env variables to build things in:
/tmp/cursor-sandbox-cache

Obviously that breaks when there are several users using the machine: the first one will get to create the directory, and others will get “permission denied” errors.

The LLM then goes on a loop to try to re-setup the sandbox, which it won’t have access to.

Steps to Reproduce

Ask for cargo check in a Rust project with two separate users of the machine

Expected Behavior

Compiles

Operating System

Linux

Version Information

Version: 2.4.31
VSCode Version: 1.105.1
Commit: 3578107fdf149b00059ddad37048220e41681000
Date: 2026-02-08T07:42:24.999Z
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: Linux x64 6.12.74

Does this stop you from using Cursor

Yes - Cursor is unusable

3

Hey, thanks for the report. That makes sense. Using a shared path like /tmp/cursor-sandbox-cache without a per-user suffix will break on any multi-user machine.

I’ve shared this with the team.

1 Like
6

We’re seeing a likely related sandbox cache issue on Linux/WSL in Cursor Agent, even on a single-user machine.

Symptoms:

  • mix precommit fails in Playwright tests with missing executable under:

/tmp/cursor-sandbox-cache//playwright/chromium_headless_shell-1208/…/chrome-headless-shell

  • Environment during agent run sets:

PLAYWRIGHT_BROWSERS_PATH=/tmp/cursor-sandbox-cache//playwright

  • That sandbox path is missing, while browsers are actually installed in:

~/.cache/ms-playwright (contains chromium_headless_shell-1208, etc.)

Context:

  • This worked previously in the same project.

  • Current failure appears tied to sandbox path/env behavior, not missing Playwright install.

Workaround:

  • Running checks with:

PLAYWRIGHT_BROWSERS_PATH=“$HOME/.cache/ms-playwright” mix precommit

avoids the failure.

Could Cursor either:

  1. avoid overriding PLAYWRIGHT_BROWSERS_PATH when user cache is available, or

  2. ensure sandbox path is consistently provisioned/populated before test runs?