Path Scope Declared

Cursor path-scoped rules must declare a globs frontmatter key. Rules without globs and without alwaysApply: true are manual-only (loaded via @-mention, not automatically).

Antipatterns

• Using paths instead of globs. Cursor reads frontmatter.globs for scoping — using paths (Claude Code's key) has no effect and the rule becomes manual-only.
• Missing globs and alwaysApply. A rule file with neither globs nor alwaysApply: true is only loaded when explicitly mentioned via @. It never fires automatically.
• Frontmatter without scope key. Adding metadata like description: "Testing rules" but omitting both globs and alwaysApply. Cursor ignores unrecognized frontmatter keys.

Pass / Fail

Pass

---
globs: ["src/**/*.py"]
---
# Testing Design

Tests exist to catch bugs, not to confirm the implementation works.

Fail

---
description: Rules for testing files
---
# Testing Design

Tests exist to catch bugs, not to confirm the implementation works.

Limitations

Does not check for alwaysApply interaction — a rule with both globs and alwaysApply: true may behave unexpectedly. Cannot detect overly broad globs like **/* that effectively disable scoping.