Mac: runner not picking up jobs

FAQ · Mac. Jobs stay on Waiting for your computer: check sleep, the login item, the log and the key.

A runner counts as online when it checked in within the last two minutes. If jobs stay on "Waiting for your computer…", work through these.

The Mac is asleep or logged out

The runner is a login item. It runs only while you are logged in, and not while the Mac is asleep. Jobs wait safely and run when it wakes; give it a minute.

Check the runner

node ~/.config/cardinal/cardinal-runner.mjs check

"Connected to Cardinal." means the address and key work. Then look at the log:

tail -n 50 ~/.config/cardinal/runner.log

What the log may say

"the token was refused (revoked, or from another workspace)": make a new install line on the Setup page and run it.
"this workspace's subscription has lapsed": the workspace owner needs to renew.
"Another Cardinal runner is already running on this computer; exiting.": one is already running; that's fine.
Errors reaching Cardinal: the runner retries, waiting longer each time up to 5 minutes. Check your connection, VPN or proxy.

Restart the login item

launchd keeps the runner running and restarts it if it stops. To restart it by hand:

launchctl bootout gui/$(id -u) ~/Library/LaunchAgents/dev.ramcore.cardinal.runner.plist
launchctl bootstrap gui/$(id -u) ~/Library/LaunchAgents/dev.ramcore.cardinal.runner.plist

If the plist file is missing, run a fresh install line from the Setup page.

Jobs fail instead of waiting

If the jobs panel shows Failed, read the reason under the badge. "claude took longer than ... and was stopped" or "timed out on your computer" usually means Claude was slow or not signed in; see "Mac: claude command not found, or not signed in".