codebox vscode <instance>

[rickmak]

Objective

1-click/line VS Code Remote SSH into a sandbox

End game DX

codebox vscode demo-project

Running this on macOS opens VS Code connected directly to the demo-project sandbox over SSH — no manual SSH config editing, no copy-pasting host aliases. The developer is dropped into the remote workspace immediately.

Proposed solution

SSH config management

codebox maintains a dedicated SSH config tree at ~/.codebox/ssh_config, using SSH's Include directive to aggregate per-instance entries:

~/.codebox/ssh_config
  Include ~/.codebox/instances/*/ssh_config  ← per-instance entries (glob)

During installation (opt-in, like shell completion), users are instructed to add one line to their ~/.ssh/config:

Include ~/.codebox/ssh_config

This means VS Code Remote SSH (and all other SSH tooling) picks up codebox-managed hosts with no additional configuration.

On codebox create, codebox writes ~/.codebox/instances/<name>/ssh_config:

Host codebox-demo-project
  HostName localhost
  User user
  Port <host-port>
  StrictHostKeyChecking no
  IdentityFile <instance-key>    # if set
  ProxyJump <remote>             # if --remote is set

On codebox delete, the per-instance file is removed.

codebox vscode <instance>

The command:

1. Looks up the instance's host port (same logic as shell)
2. Writes/refreshes ~/.codebox/instances/<name>/ssh_config
3. Constructs the URI: vscode://vscode-remote/ssh-remote+codebox-<name>/home/user
4. Opens it via open "<uri>" on macOS (xdg-open on Linux, start on Windows)

Intermediate command

Before the full vscode subcommand lands, a lower-effort stepping stone:

codebox ssh-config demo-project

Writes (or refreshes) the per-instance SSH config entry and prints:

SSH config written to ~/.codebox/instances/demo-project/ssh_config

Open in VS Code:
  open "vscode://vscode-remote/ssh-remote+codebox-demo-project/home/user"

This lets users validate the SSH config approach before the open automation is wired in, and doubles as a repair command if the config drifts.