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June 19, 2025
I recently hit a wall trying to attach Cursor IDE to a Docker container on a remote server. My AI development work came to a screeching halt. Even though Docker worked fine in my terminal, Cursor kept throwing errors like ERROR: Cannot connect to the Docker daemon. After hours of head-scratching, I found a straightforward fix that had everything running again in minutes.
The Core Problem I Faced
Every time I tried connecting Cursor to a remote Docker container, I got errors about the Docker daemon being inaccessible. The logs showed messages like Cannot connect to the Docker daemon at unix:///sybig/home/amm/.docker/run/docker.sock or Command failed with exit code 1. What baffled me? Running docker info manually worked perfectly. This made remote development in Cursor impossible, while the identical setup worked flawlessly in VS Code.
The Step-by-Step Solution That Worked
Here’s what finally did the trick for me:
- Set the DOCKER_HOST environment variable: First, I found the correct Docker socket path by running
docker context inspecton the remote machine. Mine wasunix:///run/user/2725/docker.sock. I addedexport DOCKER_HOST=unix:///run/user/2725/docker.sockto~/.bash_profile(not.bashrc), since Cursor uses login shells. - Stick to Anysphere plugins only: I removed all Microsoft remote extensions. Only Anysphere’s Remote SSH and Remote Containers plugins remained installed to prevent conflicts.
- Force a server reload: After updating variables, I opened Cursor’s command palette (Ctrl+Shift+P or Cmd+Shift+P), ran
Remote-SSH: Kill Remote Server and Reload Window, giving it a fresh start. - Update extensions and verify PATH: I upgraded the Remote Containers extension to v1.0.7+. If Docker wasn’t in PATH, I’d add
export PATH=$PATH:/docker/pathto.bash_profile.
Why This Fixed My Issue
Putting DOCKER_HOST in .bash_profile solved the socket access problem after reloading. Using only Anysphere plugins eliminated extension clashes. The upgrade handled command execution quirks. Suddenly, attaching to containers worked immediately. If you’re wrestling with similar Docker issues in Cursor, these steps might rescue your workflow too.
