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Use a Prized box with the herdr app

Updated

Add a Prized box to the herdr app as an SSH machine, so its Claude Code and Codex run on a cloud Linux machine that keeps working while your laptop sleeps: what herdr installs on the box, putting the agents on its path, and what a paused box looks like.

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herdr is a desktop app for running coding agents. It adds any machine you reach over SSH to its sidebar, so a Prized box's agents run on the box and keep going when you close herdr or your laptop sleeps (herdr's docs).

1. Get a box in your SSH config

Sign up at prized.dev: the tour starts a box on $30 of free credit with no card, then shows one command (a curl line on macOS and Linux) that installs the CLI, signs this machine in, and adds the box to your SSH config (Quickstart). Use your box's name in place of mango below (prized box ls lists them), and check that plain ssh reaches it:

ssh mango echo ok
# ok

2. Add the box in herdr

Install herdr, then use Add machine in the sidebar (or Settings › Machines), type mango, and press Enter. Type the name rather than picking from herdr's host list: the list reads only ~/.ssh/config itself, and Prized's entry sits in a file that config includes.

The first time, herdr opens a small terminal and asks before it copies its herdr-core program to ~/.local/bin on the box; say yes.

3. Put Claude Code and Codex on the path

herdr's terminals on the box get the system's default PATH, which leaves out ~/.local/bin, where the box's Claude Code and Codex live. Until they are on it, herdr's + menu lists them as not installed. Link them into /usr/local/bin once (boxes have passwordless sudo); the menu can take a minute to notice:

ssh mango 'sudo ln -sf ~/.local/bin/claude /usr/local/bin/claude && sudo ln -sf ~/.local/bin/codex /usr/local/bin/codex'

Then sign the agents in on the box, with your GitHub identity for git:

prized agents handoff claude codex --gh

It copies the sign-ins this computer has. For one it doesn't have, run claude or codex on the box and sign in there.

4. Start an agent on the box

In herdr's sidebar, click the + on the mango row (or New space there) to open a space on the box, then start Claude Code or Codex from the + in the tab bar. Don't use the tab bar menu's New space, which opens one on your computer. The space's terminals run on the box, and its agents join the same list as your computer's.

When you close herdr or the laptop sleeps

The terminals live on the box, so agents keep running. Open herdr again and it reconnects to them.

When the box sleeps

A paused box is out of reach until it wakes, and herdr's sidebar shows mango as unreachable. On macOS and Windows, a box that paused itself after sitting idle may wake when herdr reconnects; a box you paused stays paused (Auto-pause). To wake it yourself (herdr then reconnects by itself):

prized box resume mango --wait

On a Nano through Small box, the terminals and agents resume where they were, unless the box stayed paused for more than 3 days. A Medium or larger restarts on waking, so agents running in herdr stop (Pause and resume).

On the free credit, a box pauses after 2 hours idle, never in its first 24 hours. To keep it up while agents work:

prized box auto-pause mango off

Troubleshooting

SymptomWhat to do
Claude Code or Codex shows as not installed in the + menuStep 3.
herdr can't reach mangoRun ssh mango echo ok. If it says the box is paused, resume it as above; otherwise run prized doctor (Troubleshooting).