Pair your phone
With the BRODEC app on your phone paired to this computer, you can reach it from anywhere. The welcome tour’s Pair your phone step sets it up, and you can do it again any time.
Get BRODEC
BRODEC is on Google Play (org.bromigos.brodec): the tour shows a QR code that opens it.
BRODEC for iPhone is coming.
Pair
- BRODEC’s helper. Pairing uses BRODEC’s machine helper,
brodec-machine. The step explains it and installs it when you agree, the usual way: the system asks for your password in its own window. No terminal. The same password lets the helper run on this computer (Allow pairing, if it was installed some other way). - Scan the code. The step shows a big QR code and a short code. In BRODEC, open LAB › MACHINES › ADD MACHINE and scan the QR, or type the short code. A code runs out after a few minutes; the next one appears by itself.
- Confirm on your phone. BRODEC shows this computer’s name and asks you to confirm. When it’s done, the step ticks ✓.
- Let your phone run things here (optional). Restarting, updating and terminal sessions from the phone also need your say-so at this computer. In BRODEC, open LAB › MACHINES › this computer › ALLOW THIS PHONE, then press Allow… in the step. It asks for your password and shows the phone’s key: compare it with the one on the phone, then Allow.
If this computer runs your lab’s VECTOR bridge (brodec-lab), the step offers to pair it
too: Pair it asks for your password and shows the bridge’s own code.
On bromigOS Server the same step runs in the console tour: the QR is drawn in the terminal, and sudo asks for the password where the window would.
What your phone can do then
- Chat with VECTOR, from anywhere.
- Approve the fixes VECTOR proposes for this computer.
- Restart, shut down or update this computer.
- Open chat-style terminal sessions on it.
Nothing runs on this computer without your say-so: everything travels end-to-end encrypted, from your account only, and the serious requests ask for your fingerprint on the phone.
For power users
The helper is brodec-machine, a user service (brodec-machine.service). It runs only once
root’s /etc/brodec-machine/machine.toml exists; the step writes it from the packaged
example (/usr/share/brodec-machine/machine.toml.example) through polkit. On a desktop the
helper comes in brodec-desktop; a server gets the separate brodec-machine package when
the repository has it.
| Command | What it does |
|---|---|
brodec-machine pair | Shows the pairing code and its QR in the terminal, until it’s paired |
brodec-machine pair --json --start --timeout 900 | What the tour runs: one JSON event a line (code, expired, waiting, paired, failed, cancelled); exits 0 paired, 1 failed or timed out, 130 cancelled |
brodec-machine status | Paired with whom, the switch, jobs |
sudo brodec-machine enroll | Allows a phone that asked to send jobs: the machine owner’s own step, at the machine (the tour runs it through pkexec, answering its question with your choice) |
sudo brodec-lab pair --json | The same events for a lab’s VECTOR bridge |
brodec-machine off | STOP ALL: every job on this machine stops |
A code event carries the QR’s text (qr), the QR drawn as SVG (qr_svg, the window’s)
and as terminal text (qr_text, the console’s), and the code to type
(user_code_display). Leaving the step stops only the watching (SIGTERM): the agent keeps
offering codes, so pairing later still works. Pairing is the Bromigos account’s device
flow, approved from the phone with kind: "machine"; the phone checks the machine’s key
against the fingerprint in the QR, so one scan verifies both ways. BRODEC’s own
description is its docs/MACHINE_JOBS.md, “Pairing from a setup screen”.