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Worthless

What each install path gives you

What each install path gives you

Section titled “What each install path gives you”

Not every install path protects your keys. This page says exactly which does what, so you can tell whether you’re actually covered.

The table

Section titled “The table”
Install path 4 tools in your editor Proxy running (keys route) Spend cap enforced
curl -sSL https://worthless.sh | sh then worthless — Yes Yes
pipx install worthless then worthless — Yes Yes
Docker — Yes (in the container) Yes
Add to Cursor / Install in VS Code / claude mcp add / Claude Desktop Yes No No
GitHub Actions — CI-scoped CI-scoped

The part that catches people

Section titled “The part that catches people”

The one-click editor buttons install an MCP server that exposes four management tools — worthless_status, worthless_scan, worthless_lock, worthless_spend.

That server cannot start the proxy. There is no proxy-start tool. Only the CLI (worthless) starts the proxy on 127.0.0.1:8787.

This matters because worthless_lock always writes a *_BASE_URL into your .env pointing at the proxy. So if you lock a key from your editor and never start the CLI proxy:

  • your key is split (the real key is not sitting in .env), and
  • your app’s requests go to 127.0.0.1:8787, where nothing is listening, so they fail with a connection error.

You are not silently unprotected — but you are not working either. Start the proxy:

Terminal window
worthless          # from your project directory

Then confirm:

Terminal window
worthless status   # reports whether the proxy is running, and which keys are protected

Rule of thumb

Section titled “Rule of thumb”
  • Want your keys protected and your app working? Install the CLI. That is the path that does the work.
  • Want to drive Worthless from your AI editor? Add the editor tools on top of a running CLI proxy — not instead of it.

What this page does not claim

Section titled “What this page does not claim”
  • It does not claim the editor tools are useless — they let an agent scan for exposed keys, lock a .env, and read spend without you leaving the editor.
  • It does not cover whether a specific editor honours a custom OPENAI_BASE_URL for its own built-in AI features. That is a separate, unverified question — see Install for AI editors.