The documentation says that, once a host is selected, file edits, terminal commands, Git operations, MCP servers, and session history execute on the remote machine; chat, approvals, and live output remain local. It also says the initial connection copies a small self-contained helper to ~/.cline/remote/ and communicates through an SSH tunnel, without requiring root access, open ports, apt, or npm.
The mechanism is an SSH-tunneled remote helper that lets the local interface delegate tool execution and project state to the selected host. This matters now because desktop coding agents are expanding from laptop-bound contexts toward the servers, containers, and development machines where repositories, credentials, and specialized tools are already configured. The immediate implication is that teams can preserve local human approval while placing execution beside the target environment. The evidence is limited to Cline’s own documentation and does not establish reliability, performance, security posture under enterprise policy, or adoption in production workflows. Watch whether Cline documents hardened deployment patterns for jump hosts, key management, remote credential handling, and multi-user operational controls.
This begins a distinct analytical record because no prior New Runtime record was supplied for this SSH execution capability.