OSC 52 & paste warnings

[jonwilts]

Hi. I'm using neovim (v0.11.6) running in kitty (0.45.0). Sometimes I'm running neovim locally, sometimes on a remote machine over ssh that I have limited ability to configure/install on, but I do trust.

I'd like to get seamless integration between neovim and the local (macos) system clipboard regardless of whether I'm local or remote, so I'm experimenting with OSC 52. Everything does seem to work, but I do get warning messages from kitty in certain circumstances, and I'm trying to understand whether I can avoid them.

In my kitty.conf I have the following:

clipboard_control write-clipboard write-primary read-clipboard read-primary

Then, I have two kitty windows open, one local, and one ssh-ed to my remote machine, both running neovim. I also have a TextEdit window open locally.

Case 1: Copy from TextEdit, paste into kitty/neovim using CTRL+v - works, no warning, both local and remote.
Case 2: Copy from TextEdit, paste into neovim using "+p - works, but warning shown, both local and remote.

Is this expected? I understood that having read-clipboard read-primary set (both without -ask) would bypass the warning?

[kovidgoyal]

yes its expected. The proper solution for this is for neovim to support kitty's OSC 5522 https://sw.kovidgoyal.net/kitty/clipboard/ which allows you to authorize individual applications once only or out of bacnd as well.

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On Tue, Jan 27, 2026 at 10:46:54PM -0800, jonwilts wrote: Hi. I'm using neovim (v0.11.6) running in kitty (0.45.0). Sometimes I'm running neovim locally, sometimes on a remote machine over ssh that I have limited ability to configure/install on, but I do trust. I'd like to get seamless integration between neovim and the local (macos) system clipboard regardless of whether I'm local or remote, so I'm experimenting with OSC 52. Everything does seem to work, but I do get warning messages from kitty in certain circumstances, and I'm trying to understand whether I can avoid them. In my `kitty.conf` I have the following: `clipboard_control write-clipboard write-primary read-clipboard read-primary` Then, I have two kitty windows open, one local, and one ssh-ed to my remote machine, both running neovim. I also have a TextEdit window open locally. Case 1: Copy from TextEdit, paste into kitty/neovim using CTRL+v - works, no warning, both local and remote. Case 2: Copy from TextEdit, paste into neovim using "+p - works, but warning shown, both local and remote. Is this expected? I understood that having `read-clipboard read-primary` set (both without `-ask`) would bypass the warning? -- Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub: #9428 You are receiving this because you are subscribed to this thread. Message ID: ***@***.***>

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_____________________________________ Dr. Kovid Goyal https://www.kovidgoyal.net https://calibre-ebook.com

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[jonwilts]

Ok - thanks. So read-clipboard read-primary without the -ask prevents the prompt appearing only when pasting using CTRL+v? I see that implementing OSC 5522 was discussed by the neovim maintainers back in July but nothing since then, so I won’t hold my breath. Thanks again.

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On Jan 28, 2026 at 5:38:32 AM, Kovid Goyal ***@***.***> wrote: yes its expected. The proper solution for this is for neovim to support kitty's OSC 5522 https://sw.kovidgoyal.net/kitty/clipboard/ which allows you to authorize individual applications once only or out of bacnd as well. On Tue, Jan 27, 2026 at 10:46:54PM -0800, jonwilts wrote: > Hi. I'm using neovim (v0.11.6) running in kitty (0.45.0). Sometimes I'm running neovim locally, sometimes on a remote machine over ssh that I have limited ability to configure/install on, but I do trust. > > I'd like to get seamless integration between neovim and the local (macos) system clipboard regardless of whether I'm local or remote, so I'm experimenting with OSC 52. Everything does seem to work, but I do get warning messages from kitty in certain circumstances, and I'm trying to understand whether I can avoid them. > > In my `kitty.conf` I have the following: > > `clipboard_control write-clipboard write-primary read-clipboard read-primary` > > Then, I have two kitty windows open, one local, and one ssh-ed to my remote machine, both running neovim. I also have a TextEdit window open locally. > > Case 1: Copy from TextEdit, paste into kitty/neovim using CTRL+v - works, no warning, both local and remote. > Case 2: Copy from TextEdit, paste into neovim using "+p - works, but warning shown, both local and remote. > > Is this expected? I understood that having `read-clipboard read-primary` set (both without `-ask`) would bypass the warning? > > > -- > Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub: > #9428 > You are receiving this because you are subscribed to this thread. > > Message ID: ***@***.***> -- _____________________________________ Dr. Kovid Goyal https://www.kovidgoyal.net https://calibre-ebook.com _____________________________________ — Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#9428 (comment)>, or unsubscribe <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/ACFHJJGHIDG4LU4O6UXXPR34JCGSRAVCNFSM6AAAAACTEKEV72VHI2DSMVQWIX3LMV43URDJONRXK43TNFXW4Q3PNVWWK3TUHMYTKNRSG4ZDQNI> . You are receiving this because you authored the thread.Message ID: ***@***.***>

[kovidgoyal]

No, no. The documnetation of that option is pretty clear. If you disable the ask modes you wont get a confirmation prompt from kitty, easily verified by: kitty -o clipboard_control=write-clipboard\ read-clipboard sh -c "printf '\033]52;c;?\007'; cat -v" which you will see will output the contents of the clipboard without any confirmation from kitty.

[jonwilts]

Yes - that works, and now nvim seems to be working correctly too. No idea what I was doing differently yesterday. Sorry for the noise.

So the advantage of OSC 5522 in this scenario is that security isn't all or nothing; I could specifically allow neovim access while preventing/triggering a warning for other applications?

[kovidgoyal]

On Thu, Jan 29, 2026 at 01:58:52AM -0800, jonwilts wrote: Yes - that works, and now nvim seems to be working correctly too. No idea what I was doing differently yesterday. Sorry for the noise. So the advantage of OSC 5522 in this scenario is that security isn't all or nothing; I could specifically allow neovim access while preventing/triggering a warning for other applications?

Yup.

[Waujito]

Yeah, that security thing may sound good, but is it really a good idea to throw tons of warnings by default in the user's face? It's so annoying that everyone will look for a fix and disable that thing, like kitty asking me TWICE while entering the "+y command, and of course, I disabled that confirmation, so there's no additional security, just an annoyance.

Also, this topic of disabling things is really hard to find, so maybe there's a better approach than enforcing every app to implement the protocol specifically for kitty? (and enforcing users to find information about the fix?)

[kovidgoyal]

What on earth? Giving arbitrary applications runinng on possibly different machines/vms/containers unfetterred access to your clipboard is a security risk. One which any halfway decent terminal emulator will either deny or ask for confirmation for by default. I went to the trouble of creating a actual solution for this problem via the OSC 5522 protocol. If you want to complain about it go complain to your editors developers to implement support for that solution.

[jonwilts]

I agree, though I also recognize that persuading the nvim developers to add support for OSC 5522 will be a long, slow process. I took a look at it, but it would be beyond my capabilities.

In the meantime, I did wonder whether it would be feasible to make this setting a per-window option in Kitty. I spend most of my working day ssh-ing into servers, some of which I fully control and so trust, and some I don't. Ideally I'd be able to have this security setting on be default, but by able to switch it off when ssh-ed into a box that I trust.

[kovidgoyal]

On Mon, Feb 23, 2026 at 06:37:40AM -0800, jonwilts wrote: In the meantime, I did wonder whether it would be feasible to make this setting a per-window option in Kitty. I spend most of my working day ssh-ing into servers, some of which I fully control and so trust, and some I don't. Ideally I'd be able to have this security setting on be default, but by able to switch it off when ssh-ed into a box that I trust.

You can use an alias like ssh=kitty -o paste_actions=whatever kitten ssh will give you a new os window per ssh rather than a new window, but better than nothing.