Flightdeck DocumentationGitHub

Control Any FlightDeck

For a machine you keep running for agents, use a worker. This page is for the other case: opening a window onto the terminal UI or Desktop that someone (or you) has running on another computer.

The Desktop connects to the other machine's FlightDeck Web interface, over your local network or a VPN, so it needs nothing new on that machine. flightdeck connect can attach to it the same way from a terminal.

On the machine you want to control:

  1. Run Start Web Interface from the command palette.
  2. In the access panel, press n for network mode and read the address and the 4-digit code it shows.

On the machine you are at, choose Connect to remote… (the launcher, or File in the menu bar), type the address and the code, and pick Control or Observe. The remote opens in its own window, with the usual sidebar, git strip and terminals.

  • You browse independently. Looking at another agent never moves the selection on the other screen. A small host marker shows which agent the person at that machine is looking at.
  • Commands act on what you see. Push, Finish, Restart, Close and the rest act on the agent this window shows, with the same refusals and the same typed-name step for destructive answers as a browser. Dialogs are shared: they appear on both screens and either side can answer.
  • Typing is shared through FlightDeck Web's input lock. Take over from the status bar when someone else is typing, or switch to Observe.
  • Pairing is remembered in ~/.flightdeck/remotes.json (owner-only), so reconnecting needs no code. Forget a remote from the connect window, or revoke it from the other machine's access panel, where it is listed as FlightDeck Desktop. Nothing connects when the app starts until you choose a remote.
  • The link is plain WebSocket, like FlightDeck Web. The first connect to an address outside loopback or Tailscale warns you once. Use it on a network you trust, or over Tailscale or WireGuard.

Edit the other machine's files in VS Code

Open Worktree in VS Code (command palette, or right-click an agent) opens the folder the agent works in in VS Code on the machine you are at. A remote window opens it over SSH with VS Code's Remote - SSH extension, so the files stay on the other machine and VS Code's terminal, git and language servers run there. A local window just opens the folder.

For a remote window you need:

  • VS Code with the Remote - SSH extension on the machine you are at.
  • SSH access to the other machine as the account FlightDeck runs as there. On Linux, tailscale up --ssh lets your tailnet log in with no keys. On macOS, turn on Remote Login under System Settings → General → Sharing. On Windows, add the OpenSSH Server optional feature.

By default FlightDeck connects as the other machine's FlightDeck user, at the address you connected to (user@100.73.111.96). To use a Host entry from ~/.ssh/config instead, add "ssh_target": "my-alias" to that remote's record in ~/.flightdeck/remotes.json. It is read each time you open a folder. Set one when SSH needs something the address does not say: a port other than 22, a different user, or a remote you reach through a tunnel such as localhost:7420.

Mission control (Alt-m) works in a remote window as it does locally. Split view is not offered in a remote window yet. The remote's terminals keep the other machine's size: the window shows that grid and does not resize it.