Desktop launches can inherit a sparse GUI environment, while user runtimes such as nvm and Homebrew are often initialized from shell startup files. Capture a bounded login+interactive shell environment once and reuse it for desktop CLI sessions, scheduled tasks, and MCP stdio startup while keeping explicit MCP PATH and provider-managed env overrides authoritative.
Constraint: macOS app launches may omit user shell PATH and exported runtime variables
Rejected: Patch only MCP stdio | leaves normal desktop sessions and scheduled tasks inconsistent
Confidence: high
Scope-risk: moderate
Directive: Keep provider/OAuth scrubbing after shell env merging when changing child env builders
Tested: bun test src/utils/terminalShellEnvironment.test.ts src/utils/mcpStdioEnvironment.test.ts src/server/services/mcpHostPreflight.test.ts src/server/__tests__/conversation-service.test.ts src/server/__tests__/cron-scheduler-launcher.test.ts src/server/__tests__/mcp.test.ts
Tested: bun run check:server
Tested: bun run check:coverage
Tested: bun run verify
Not-tested: Real desktop UI live-model smoke on an installed .app
Bypass all three gating layers (compile-time feature flag, subscription
check, GrowthBook remote config) and replace Anthropic's private native
modules (@ant/computer-use-swift, @ant/computer-use-input) with a Python
bridge using pyautogui + mss + pyobjc. Works on any macOS with any
Anthropic-protocol compatible model.
