Remote mode: the agent rents its machine

Remote mode is a habit you give your agent: when a task needs a real machine, it rents one at FFxF, works on it over SSH, brings back the result and destroys it. Your computer stays clean, and you pay for the hours the task took.

To see it happen, read a real run, call by call: the machine was delivered in 42 seconds, destroyed in 10, for 0.018 CAD.

When it is worth it

long builds and test suites that tie up the laptop;
anything that needs root or Docker, which you would rather not give the agent locally;
a service that has to keep running for hours, or be reachable from the internet;
heavy downloads, or code you do not trust enough to run at home.

Give the agent the habit

Paste this into the instruction file of the project: AGENTS.md for Codex and most agents, CLAUDE.md for Claude Code. Change the ceiling to what you accept to spend without being asked.

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## Remote machines (FFxF)

When a task needs a real machine (long build or tests, root or Docker, a service that must keep running, heavy downloads, untrusted code), rent one with the ffxf MCP tools instead of using this computer:

1. estimate_vm: plan nano (or larger if the task needs it), region montreal, image coding-agent, billing hourly, my SSH key. Show me the price.
2. Without asking again, you may spend up to 2 CAD per task.
3. create_vm with password_delivery none, then get_action until completed.
4. ssh ubuntu@<ipv4>, work in ~/work, push the branch or copy the results back.
5. destroy_vm as soon as the task is done, and tell me what it cost.

Setup, if the ffxf tools are missing: https://ffxf.net/agents.md

The coding-agent image

coding-agent is Ubuntu with what an agent reaches for: Docker, git and GitHub CLI, Node.js, Python with uv, ripgrep and tmux, plus Claude Code and Codex CLI. It carries no secret: whoever uses it signs in with their own account. The machine answers to ubuntu over SSH with the key passed at order time.

What it costs

A Nano (1 vCPU, 2 GB) costs 0.018 CAD an hour. Every hour started is owed: a machine created and destroyed within the hour costs 0.018 CAD. An hourly order is accepted only when the balance covers the first 24 hours; only the hours actually started are charged. Bigger plans and their prices come from list_plans, or Plans and regions.

What keeps it safe

The key's scopes: without vms.destroy, the agent cannot delete a machine; without vms.create, it cannot order one.
The monthly budget in the console: past 120 % of it, machines stop.
The quota of machines per account, and the prepaid credit: the balance never goes negative.
The hostname confirmation that destroy_vm and reinstall_vm require.

get_account shows the balance, the burn rate of running machines and how long the credit lasts. Ask the agent for it at the end of a session: a machine forgotten there shows up at once.