Feature request for product/service
Cursor IDE
Describe the request
Summary On Linux (Cinnamon panel / xapp-status tray) and likely other desktops with a system tray, Cursor publishes a StatusNotifier icon whose tooltip is Cursor (N) with a red “unread/urgent” dot. As an end user there is currently no way to see what those N items are, no way to navigate to them, and no way to dismiss any one of them — only to ignore the badge or fully quit and relaunch Cursor.
Repro / observed behavior
Linux Mint 22.3, Cinnamon 6.6.7, X11. Cursor 3.4.20 (Electron 39.8.1).
Open Cursor on a project.
Over some time the tray icon’s tooltip becomes e.g. Cursor (9) with a red dot. The in-app Notifications bell (status bar) is empty.
There is no UI inside Cursor that shows the same 9 items, no panel that enumerates them, no quick-pick to navigate them, and clearing the bell doesn’t affect the tray badge.
Confirmed via D-Bus introspection that the tray icon and its tooltip are published by Cursor itself (the main cursor process), not by Cinnamon. So only Cursor can update or surface it.
Quitting Cursor completely and relaunching clears the badge — but that loses all the items it was tracking. There is no way to see what was lost.
Why this matters
A red badge with no detail and no navigation is signal-only noise: users either ignore it (badge becomes meaningless) or lose context by force-quitting.
VS Code’s “bell” gives a list and per-item actions; the tray badge is a separate, opaque counter on top of that. Today the two don’t agree, which makes both less trustworthy.
The badge often outlives the user-visible source (e.g. an agent finished, a problem was already fixed, a source-control change was committed). Without a list there’s no way to even know whether the items are still relevant.
Suggested behavior
Click on tray icon → “Urgent items”/“Inbox” panel that lists every item contributing to Cursor (N), including for each:
Category — Problems / Source Control / Background agent / Bugbot / Extension toast / Update / etc.
Title and short body (e.g. TypeScript: cannot find module ‘x’, Agent finished: ‘refactor handler’, 12 changes ready to commit in workspace foo).
Origin — workspace/folder, file:line if applicable, agent id, extension id.
Timestamp.
Action: “Go to” (opens the relevant editor / panel / agent), “Dismiss”, and where appropriate “Snooze”.
Right-click on tray icon → quick menu with Show Urgent (N), Dismiss All, Mute Until Restart, Open Cursor.
Command palette commands:
Cursor: Show Tray Badge Items — opens the same list.
Cursor: Clear Tray Badge — clears the badge but leaves underlying state.
The badge (N) must always match a user-visible list inside Cursor. If N > 0 and the list is empty, that’s a bug. Add a CI/dev assertion if helpful.
Per-source toggles in Settings: Tray badge: Include Problems, … Source Control changes, … Agents, … Bugbot, … Extension toasts. So users can decide what counts as “urgent.”
Persistence on relaunch: if the items are still real after restart (e.g. uncommitted changes), the badge should re-appear; if they were transient state, they shouldn’t (and the user shouldn’t have to relaunch to find out).
Accessibility: tooltip should include a short cue when possible, e.g. Cursor (9): 6 problems, 2 changes, 1 agent, so users can triage without opening the list.
Acceptance criteria (suggested)
I can hover the tray icon and see a richer tooltip than just Cursor (N).
I can left-click (or palette) and get a list of exactly N items, each with a clickable navigation target.
I can dismiss / clear individual items, and the badge updates accordingly.
After every Cursor session, the badge count and the in-app list agree.
Workaround today
Quit and relaunch Cursor. Loses context.