Laptop Tools for Agents on Another Machine¶

Some tools only make sense on the machine in front of you. Computer control acts on the screen you are looking at; a browser extension's MCP server lives where the browser runs. When your agents run on another of your machines (an always-on Mac mini or a Cloud DevSpace, the hub), the MCP gateway makes those laptop-bound MCP servers available to them.

The agent stays in charge. Offering a server only adds it to the hub agent's tool list under an explicit name, such as computer-laptop. Nothing routes calls through the gateway automatically, wraps commands, or prefers the laptop over the hub. The agent decides when a laptop tool is the right one, and tells you where something ran.

How it works¶

On the laptop, you choose which MCP servers other devices may open. Each one is a local stdio MCP server listed in ~/.openbase/mcp-gateway.json. Nothing is served until you add it.
On the hub, you offer one of them to the hub's agents. Openbase adds an MCP server named <name>-laptop to its Claude Code and Codex session profiles. When an agent calls it, the hub opens an authenticated WebSocket to the laptop's Openbase runtime over your Openbase network, and the laptop starts that server's process for the session. The process stops when the session ends.
Only devices signed in to your Openbase account can open a served server. The laptop accepts the same owner sign-in it accepts for every other request between your devices, and refuses any name that is not in its served list.
If the laptop is asleep, offline, or does not serve that name, the hub's connection fails within a few seconds and the agent sees the server as unavailable instead of waiting.

Set it up¶

On the laptop, serve the built-in computer-control server (or any stdio MCP command after --):

openbase-coder mcp-gateway serve add computer
openbase-coder mcp-gateway serve add browser -- npx some-browser-mcp
openbase-coder mcp-gateway serve list

On the hub, offer it to agents, naming the laptop as it appears in your device list:

openbase-coder mcp-gateway offer computer --peer my-laptop
openbase-coder mcp-gateway offered

New agent sessions on the hub now list computer-laptop. Sessions that were already running keep their old tool list until they restart.

Commands¶

Command	Where	What it does
`mcp-gateway serve add <name> [-- command...]`	laptop	Serve a built-in server (`computer`) or any stdio MCP command under `<name>`. Put `--description` before `<name>`.
`mcp-gateway serve remove <name>`	laptop	Stop serving `<name>`. Open sessions end when they disconnect.
`mcp-gateway serve list`	laptop	Served servers, plus built-ins that are not served.
`mcp-gateway offer <name> --peer <device>`	hub	Add `<name>-laptop` to this machine's agent profiles.
`mcp-gateway withdraw <name>`	hub	Remove `<name>-laptop` from the profiles.
`mcp-gateway offered`	hub	Offered servers, their device, and the profiles that list them.
`mcp-gateway connect <name> --peer <device>`	hub	The stdio MCP server the profiles run. Agents start it; you normally don't. Exits with code 69 when the device is unreachable.

offer edits the Claude Code profile (~/.openbase/profiles/claude/mcp.json) and the Openbase Codex profiles that already exist. It never replaces an MCP server of your own that happens to use the same name, and withdraw removes only entries that offer created.

Other laptop tools¶

When your machines run the hub/edge sync, hub agents can also reach the laptop with the edge command: edge run for display-bound commands such as open or pbcopy, edge where to check whether a file is present on both machines, and edge forward to reach a laptop port such as Chrome's DevTools port. The bundled openbase-laptop-tools skill teaches agents these options. As with the gateway, the agent uses them only when it decides to.

Troubleshooting¶

The agent says computer-laptop is unavailable. Check that the laptop is awake and online, that openbase-coder mcp-gateway serve list on the laptop shows the server, and that both machines are signed in to the same Openbase account. Running openbase-coder mcp-gateway connect computer --peer my-laptop on the hub prints the reason on stderr.
The device name is not found. Use the name shown for the laptop in your device list (or its Openbase network host name).
Computer control on the laptop asks for permissions. macOS Screen Recording and Accessibility permissions are granted on the laptop, not the hub.