Image: amontlabs/lcu
Why it mattersA developer who prefers Claude Code can now have the agent control desktop apps and the browser without switching to the ChatGPT app, under a per-app approval list.
A developer who uses Claude Code can now tell it to open a window, click a button or read a Safari tab, without leaving the terminal for the ChatGPT desktop app.
LCU, which the project describes as "Codex computer use, decoupled from the app", is an open-source bridge that takes the computer-use runtime bundled with the official ChatGPT desktop app and exposes it to other coding harnesses. The repository is MIT licensed, was created on 22 September 2026, and reached 471 stars by 6 October. The maintainers shipped five releases in the two days before that, up to v0.9.5 on 5 October.
What it lets a coding agent do
Through LCU, an agent in the host harness can read any desktop window, click, type and take screenshots. Chrome tabs are supported through the project's official extension, and each site has to be approved before the agent can act on it. The maintainers list adapters for Pi, the Codex CLI and Claude Code, with experimental support for Oh My Pi and Hermes.
How the approval list works
The ChatGPT desktop app's computer-use runtime asks the user to approve the first time an agent controls a given app. In Claude Code, that request used to fail with "Computer Use was not approved". The project ships a small Claude Code mod called lcu-approve that shows the question as a native computer-use approval panel in the Claude app and in the terminal. The user can allow once, always allow (remembered with Touch ID on macOS) or deny.
On the terminal side, lcu apps lists what is always allowed, lcu apps allow Zed grants an app, and lcu apps revoke Zed takes it back. The maintainers say running sessions pick the change up right away, and that an agent cannot answer the Touch ID prompt in the user's place. Browsers, password managers and other high-risk apps come with a warning, and Terminal and iTerm2 are declined outright.
What a user has to install
The project's requirements page lists Python 3.12 or newer, the signed ChatGPT desktop app (used only for its bundled runtime), and a maintained harness: Pi, Codex CLI, Claude Code 2.1.287 or newer, Oh My Pi or Hermes. The supported platforms are macOS on Apple Silicon and Linux on ARM64 or x86-64 with an X11 desktop and D-Bus. Intel Macs, native Wayland and musl Linux are not supported, and the maintainers describe Windows 11 x64 as a candidate rather than a shipping target. The ChatGPT app still asks for the usual accessibility and screen-recording permissions on first use.
Source
- Primary source: amontlabs/lcu on GitHub
- Latest release notes: LCU 0.9.5
This item was written by an AI system from the linked source. Reveneau is responsible for what it publishes.
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