From 4560435dd9c98076ac1613e50febdffa5667f475 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: LukeParkerDev <10430890+Hona@users.noreply.github.com>
Date: Fri, 17 Apr 2026 14:52:10 +1000
Subject: [PATCH] fix(desktop-wsl): spawn WSL commands as root to bypass
 first-run setup

A freshly installed Ubuntu-24.04 distro prompts interactively for a new UNIX user on its first invocation; with piped stdio that prompt blocks forever and the sidecar never starts. Adding --user root to wslArgs sidesteps the whole first-run flow for every wsl.exe we spawn (sidecar, resolveWslOpencode, probes). opencode inside WSL only needs an HTTP listener so running as root is fine.
---
 packages/desktop-electron/src/main/wsl.ts | 12 ++++++++++--
 1 file changed, 10 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)

diff --git a/packages/desktop-electron/src/main/wsl.ts b/packages/desktop-electron/src/main/wsl.ts
index 6f5c2bca17..7f441ceae9 100644
--- a/packages/desktop-electron/src/main/wsl.ts
+++ b/packages/desktop-electron/src/main/wsl.ts
@@ -18,9 +18,17 @@ type RunWslOptions = {
   signal?: AbortSignal
 }
 
+// `--user root` bypasses the distro's default-user requirement. A freshly
+// installed WSL distro (Ubuntu-24.04 in particular) prompts interactively
+// for a username/password on its first invocation; when spawned with
+// piped stdio that prompt blocks forever or silently reads garbage,
+// leaving the sidecar hanging and the server unhealthy. Running as root
+// sidesteps the entire first-run setup flow — opencode only needs an
+// HTTP listener in the distro, not a per-user environment, so root is
+// a safe default for the sidecar process.
 export function wslArgs(args: string[], distro?: string | null) {
-  if (distro) return ["-d", distro, "--", ...args]
-  return ["--", ...args]
+  if (distro) return ["-d", distro, "--user", "root", "--", ...args]
+  return ["--user", "root", "--", ...args]
 }
 
 export function runWsl(args: string[], opts: RunWslOptions = {}) {