Feature request : remote access via mobile app

[NimChimpsky]

I want to be able to continue my laptop local coding session on my mobile phone.

Either dedicated app (best imo), or telegram/whatsapp/signal, or a webapp (that I would access via phone)

[dirac-run]

This is a cool feature. Putting it on the roadmap, might take a bit to implement it correctly

[7heMech]

Imo I don't think this is something which Dirac should implement itself, since it can be achieved via other means, but I'd be cool yeah.

Edit: maybe what'd be sensible is another repo which is a telegram bot which also interacts with Dirac.

[NimChimpsky]

what other means ?

[7heMech]

what other means ?

A ton, let me mention a few:

• SSH + tmux/zellij over Tailscale: The classic dev approach. You run Dirac inside a multiplexer on your laptop, put both devices on a Tailscale mesh network, and use a mobile SSH app like Termius to attach to the session from your phone. It's bulletproof and keeps the session alive. (simpler than it sounds)
• VS Code Remote Tunnels: If you run Dirac inside VS Code's integrated terminal, you can just turn on Remote Tunnels on your laptop. Then, grab your phone, go to vscode.dev, log in, and you have access to the live terminal natively in your mobile browser.
• Web-Based Terminal Streaming (ttyd or gotty): You can use these CLI tools to instantly turn your laptop's terminal into a web application. Slap a Cloudflare Tunnel (cloudflared) or Tailscale Funnel in front of it, and you have a secure, custom URL to access your terminal from your phone.
• A Custom Telegram/Discord Wrapper: Expanding on my edit, you don't need Dirac to handle the networking. You just write a lightweight Node or Python script that listens to a Telegram bot API, passes your text into the local Dirac process (via stdin), and pipes the stdout back to your chat.

Along with many more depending on your preferred workflow:

• Mosh (Mobile Shell): Similar to SSH but specifically designed for mobile roaming, so your terminal connection doesn't drop when your phone switches from WiFi to cellular.
• Apache Guacamole: A clientless remote desktop gateway that would let you access your laptop's environment directly through any standard mobile web browser.
• Chrome Remote Desktop / AnyDesk (RustDesk is better lol): The brute-force method. Just remote into your laptop's entire GUI from a mobile app. It's clunky on a small screen, but requires zero terminal configuration.
• JupyterLab + ngrok: Running a local Jupyter server gives you web-based terminal access out of the box, which you can easily expose to the public internet using ngrok or localtunnel.
• Reverse SSH port forwarding: Bouncing your local terminal session off a cheap $5 cloud VPS so your phone always has a static IP to connect to, bypassing complex NAT or home router configurations entirely.

There are even more...

[7heMech]

Here's an example of the https://vscode.dev method

[NimChimpsky]

most of these look pretty clunky - vscode.dev thanks, I'll give it a try. A slick remote control like claude is the most requested feature for codex.

[NimChimpsky]

and vscode dev uses the github repo not local

[7heMech]

and vscode dev uses the github repo not local

It doesn't, VS Code Remote Tunnels fundamentally changes that behavior as shown in my screenshots, but I'd recommend the first method with tailscale actually

[NimChimpsky]

dirac can't be installed in web vs code. You are right about local/github, my mistake.

tailscale - well sure, but its super clunky

[7heMech]

Personally I'd do tailscale with termbot (which isn't described above) or even remove tailscale if I have public IP and just use passkey auth

[7heMech]

dirac can't be installed in web vs code. You are right about local/github, my mistake.

tailscale - well sure, but its super clunky

dirac is a cli tool, and it also has a VSCode extension, so that's two ways to use it.

[7heMech]

Why are you arguing with me anyway, I know how all of the options I suggested work, that's why I'm listing them, nothing stops you from vibe coding option 4 yourself in 30 mins or less.

[NimChimpsky]

you suggested using vscode.dev as a solution for remote access to dirac, this doesn't work via the dirac extension, and terminal is disabled via vscode.dev.

I am trying to access dirac remotely.

[7heMech]

you suggested using vscode.dev as a solution for remote access to dirac, this doesn't work via the dirac extension, and terminal is disabled via vscode.dev.

I am trying to access dirac remotely.

Then you're not doing it correctly, please ask your favorite search-enabled AI assistant of choice for help, this is a simple task, if connection was proper terminal would work.

[thiswillbeyourgithub]

Regarding establishing connection from a mobile, I have a hunch iroh might be a good stack for this.

Personally I'm very used to ssh + termux + tmux. I also use claude code you see and the mobile setup ended up not that helpful because I invariably end up stuck because I need some shell command to check something and don't want to fill the context for nothing ("how big is file.zip already?"). It also does not handle all features of claude code like /settings or /fork or /context.

I do think that either a web version (i.e. dirac spinning up a webserver via a daemon, the mhone connects to it) or a cli version (easy to insall and run in termux) would be good to avoid those pitfalls.

Edit: i am only using the cli version of dirac