fix(browser): Browser Use cannot connect to IAB from Node REPL on macOS #20678

What issue are you seeing?

Browser Use is installed and the in-app browser is open, but Browser bootstrap fails from the discovered Node REPL tool:

Failed to connect to browser-use backend "iab"

This is on macOS, not Windows/MSIX.

Environment

Codex Desktop: 26.429.20946
codex-cli in app bundle: 0.128.0-alpha.1
Browser Use plugin: openai-bundled/browser-use/0.1.0-alpha1
OS: macOS

Feature state from app-bundled CLI:

apps              true
browser_use       true
computer_use      true
in_app_browser    true
plugins           true
js_repl           removed false

What I verified

The IAB socket exists under:

/tmp/codex-browser-use/*.sock

From normal app-bundled Node, JSON-RPC getInfo with the current session_id and turn_id succeeds and returns:

type: iab
name: Codex In-app Browser
version: 26.429.20946

From mcp__node_repl__js, the same socket connects and writes, but no response is received before timeout. Browser bootstrap then fails with:

Failed to connect to browser-use backend "iab"

Expected behavior

When Browser Use is enabled and the in-app browser is open, the discovered Node REPL tool should be able to initialize Browser Use against the IAB backend.

Notes

This looks different from the Windows helper-binary/path issues. The IAB backend exists and responds from normal Node, but not from the Node REPL tool used by the Browser skill.