Auto Update Cursor on Linux

If you are using Cursor with .AppImage format, you would have noticed that the auto updater doesn’t work. Here is how you can fix it

1. Write an update script: symlinks are needed to work around updating a running instance of cursor

   $ cat ~/Documents/software/cursor/update.sh 
   #!/bin/bash
   
   APPDIR="/opt/cursor"
   SYMLINK="$APPDIR/cursor.AppImage"
   TIMESTAMP=$(date +"%Y%m%d%H%M%S")
   
   # Fetch the latest download URL from the Cursor API
   APPIMAGE_URL=$(curl -s 'https://www.cursor.com/api/download?platform=linux-x64&releaseTrack=latest' | jq -r '.downloadUrl')
   
   # Validate that we got a URL
   if [[ -z "$APPIMAGE_URL" || "$APPIMAGE_URL" == "null" ]]; then
       echo "Failed to fetch download URL from Cursor API"
       exit 1
   fi
   
   # Download to a versioned filename
   NEW_APPIMAGE="$APPDIR/cursor.AppImage.$TIMESTAMP"
   mkdir -p "$APPDIR"
   wget -O "$NEW_APPIMAGE" "$APPIMAGE_URL"
   chmod +x "$NEW_APPIMAGE"
   
   # Update the symlink to point to the new version
   ln -sfn "$NEW_APPIMAGE" "$SYMLINK"
   
   # Optionally, clean up older versions (keep last 3)
   ls -tp "$APPDIR"/cursor.AppImage.* | grep -v '/$' | tail -n +4 | xargs -r rm --
   
   echo "Cursor updated successfully: $NEW_APPIMAGE"

2. Make an update systemd service

   $ cat /etc/systemd/system/cursor-update.service 
   [Unit]
   Description=Update Cursor
   
   [Service]
   ExecStart=/home/d/software/cursor/update.sh
   Type=oneshot

3. Run it on a schedule

   $ cat /etc/systemd/system/cursor-update.timer 
   [Unit]
   Description=Run Update Cursor every 6 hours
   
   [Timer]
   OnBootSec=5min
   OnUnitActiveSec=6h
   Persistent=true
   
   [Install]
   WantedBy=timers.target