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Cursor Setup

Use this guide to connect Cursor to Lens Studio, install the CLAD Lens Studio plugin, and start building a SPECS Lens.

Before You Start

Before you start, make sure:

  1. A Lens Studio project prepared for SPECS is open in the Lens Studio editor — Setup Lens Studio.
  2. A terminal is open in the Lens Studio project folder — Open Project in CLI.

Note: The order of these setup steps matter. Lens Studio must be opened first so that it can create an MCP for the terminal to auto-connect to.

Install Cursor

Please review Cursor’s documentation on how to install Cursor: https://cursor.com/home

Download and install the Cursor desktop app for your platform, then confirm the CLI is on your PATH:

cursor --version

Start Cursor

From your Lens Studio project folder, start Cursor:

macOS (using Bash/Zsh) / Windows (using PowerShell)

cursor

For the remainder of this guide we will be using Cursor’s GUI, but Cursor also provides CLI functionality, documented here: https://cursor.com/cli

Install the plugin marketplace

For the most up-to-date installation steps, please refer to the ls-extensions repository readme, which can be accessed here: https://github.com/lens-studio-devs/ls-extensions.

Cursor does not allow support installing plugin marketplaces by url directly, so we will download the plugin marketplace from github and then add it to Cursor. First clone the github repository for our plugin marketplace. This first command will clone the repository into your current directory:

git clone https://github.com/lens-studio-devs/ls-extensions.git

Install the CLAD plugin

Now we will copy the CLAD plugin from the marketplace into Cursor’s local plugin directory.

Select your platform:

Create the local plugins folder under your Cursor settings if it does not exist yet. The -p flag creates any missing parent directories and does not error if the folder is already there:

mkdir -p ~/.cursor/plugins/local

Copy the ls-clad folder from your local clone of the marketplace repo into Cursor’s local plugins directory:

cp -R ls-extensions/plugins/ls-clad ~/.cursor/plugins/local/ls-clad

Create the local plugins folder under your Cursor settings if it does not exist yet. -Force avoids errors if the path already exists; Out-Null hides routine output:

New-Item -ItemType Directory -Force -Path "$env:USERPROFILE\.cursor\plugins\local" | Out-Null

Copy the ls-clad folder from your local clone of the marketplace repo into Cursor’s local plugins directory. -Recurse copies the whole tree; -Force overwrites an existing install:

Copy-Item -Recurse -Force ls-extensions\plugins\ls-clad "$env:USERPROFILE\.cursor\plugins\local\ls-clad"

After copying the plugin, reload Cursor so it picks up the new plugin. Open the command palette, then run Developer: Reload Window.

Open the command palette with Cmd + Shift + P, then run Developer: Reload Window.

Open the command palette with Ctrl + Shift + P, then run Developer: Reload Window.

If your new plugin still does not appear, fully quit and reopen Cursor — a full restart is the most reliable option.

Confirm Plugin Installation

  1. In Cursor, select in the toolbar: Cursor > Settings > Cursor Settings.

  2. Then select Plugins in the vertical menu to confirm Ls Clad shows up as a plugin.

Verify MCP Connection

  1. In Cursor, select in the toolbar: Cursor > Settings > Cursor Settings.

  2. Select the toggle beside lens-studio to enable the MCP.

Tips for troubleshooting MCP connection: Troubleshoot Lens Studio MCP.

Enable Run Everything

  1. In Cursor, select in the toolbar: Cursor > Settings > Cursor Settings.

  2. In the Agents section, set Run Mode to Run Everything.

Alternatively, you can select Auto-review and add lens-studio to the MCP Allowlist so Lens Studio tool calls do not require your input.

Start Building

Ask Cursor to build a SPECS Lens. Example prompt:

Can you please build me a periodic table SPECS Lens showing the atomic structure of various elements?

Await Completion

Let Cursor work. A full Lens build can take 30+ minutes.