exe.dev for Omarchy

Browse and fuzzy-find your exe.dev virtual machines from the Omarchy bar. Open a VM in your browser or SSH into it without leaving the desktop.

An independent community plugin, not an official exe.dev or Omarchy product.

Preview rendered from the native QML components with fictional VM names and metadata. No live account data is shown.

Features

• Lists VMs grouped by their first tag, sorted by name within each group.
• Press / to fuzzy-find by VM name, with a flat, best-match-first result list.
• Shows emoji, description, tags, status, and public-web visibility.
• Minimal VM details on Enter, with browser/SSH buttons and full connection info.
• Always-visible B/S shortcut guide; quick-launch actions respect API access restrictions.
• Click a VM to SSH by default, configurable to browser or details.
• Relative creation age beside the VM name; restart, pause/resume, and copy actions with explicit confirmation and administration-access checks.
• E opens the exe.dev REPL in a new floating terminal.
• Keyboard navigation, scrolling, and theme-aware styling.
• Refreshes on open and periodically while open; retains the last successful list in memory when a query fails.
• No build step, extra daemon, account tokens, or Node/Python runtime required.

Requirements

• Omarchy Quattro with the Quickshell shell/plugin system and qs.Ui helpers. Tested on Omarchy 4.0.6-1; older Waybar-based releases are not supported.
• OpenSSH (ssh) and GNU coreutils (timeout).
• Omarchy's omarchy-launch-browser and omarchy-launch-terminal commands, and your configured browser and terminal. The REPL shortcut uses --app-id=org.omarchy.terminal, which Omarchy's stock window rules float.
• An exe.dev account and SSH authentication usable by the desktop shell.

These desktop tools ship with the supported Omarchy environment. Node.js is only needed to run development tests.

Authenticate first

In a terminal, run:

ssh exe.dev
ssh exe.dev ls --json

Complete registration if needed. Before accepting a new SSH host key, verify it against exe.dev's host-key documentation. Do not disable host-key checking to make the plugin connect.

Background queries use batch mode: they cannot display a password or passphrase prompt. If your key is encrypted, unlock it in the SSH agent available to your Omarchy session. Your existing SSH configuration and agent are respected; the plugin does not edit keys, SSH config, or known-hosts files.

Install

Review the source before enabling: Omarchy plugins run unsandboxed as your user.

omarchy plugin add https://github.com/ckreiling/omarchy-exe-dev.git --enable

The plugin ID is cmk.exe-dev. Omarchy validates the manifest and installs the Git checkout under ~/.config/omarchy/plugins/cmk.exe-dev/. The default bar section is right; the interactive installer can ask where you want it. No custom installer, install hook, package installation, or privileged operation is required.

For a staged installation, omit --enable, decline enabling if prompted, review the installed files, then run:

omarchy plugin enable cmk.exe-dev

Move it later with:

omarchy bar move cmk.exe-dev --section right

Usage

Click the bar's server icon to open the list. The header globe opens the exe.dev dashboard; the refresh button reloads the VMs. Middle-click the bar icon to refresh without opening the panel.

Hover or use ↑/↓ to select a VM. S opens SSH; B opens the browser, directly from either the list or details. The footer displays these shortcuts without adding buttons to every row.

Enter opens details: the VM's name, emoji and human-readable creation age become the panel title (for example, "Created just now" or "Created 3 days ago"). The age updates while details are open; hover for the exact timestamp. Hostname, status, web port, sharing, and egress policy are grouped together directly below, followed by the description and tags. A dense metadata grid shows CPU/RAM/disk, region, email receiving and image, when returned by the API. Full image references and clipped values are available on hover. SSH and Browser buttons retain their full destinations in tooltips. In details, use the arrow keys to select an action and Enter to activate it, or use S/B directly for SSH/browser. Escape or the back arrow returns to the same filtered list and selection.

Clicking a VM opens SSH by default. You can change this to browser or details in the plugin settings; the setting affects mouse clicks only.

The browser action opens https://<vm-name>.exe.xyz/. The terminal action runs SSH using the API's validated ssh_dest, including username-routed destinations. Neither action changes a VM's web-sharing or access settings.

VM management

Details also provide Copy, Restart, and Pause (or Resume for a paused VM). These controls require the API's administration permission and ask for confirmation naming the target VM. Enter confirms; Escape cancels without executing a command.

Copy uses exe.dev's auto-generated name and consumes additional VM capacity. Restart interrupts running work and connections; pause suspends the VM until resumed. Commands run in the background, display their outcome, and refresh the list afterward. Only one management command runs at a time. Requests have a 120-second deadline. Timeouts or SSH disconnects can leave the outcome unknown: management stays disabled until a subsequent inventory refresh succeeds. Check the refreshed inventory before retrying, especially before making another copy. Confirmation ignores held-key repeats and requires a fresh Enter press.

On the main list, E opens a new floating terminal running ssh exe.dev. It does not act on the selected VM. While typing a filter, E is ordinary text.

Keyboard

Key	Action
/	Focus the VM-name fuzzy finder; select any existing query
Enter while filtering	Return focus to the filtered list without opening a VM
Escape while filtering	Clear the filter and return focus to the list
↑ / ↓ or K / J	Select VM
Enter / Space in the list	Open details for the selected VM
Arrows or H / J / K / L in details	Select a launch or management action
Enter / Space in details	Launch the selected action
Escape in details	Return to the list, keeping the query and selection
B / S	Open the selected VM in browser / SSH
E in the list	Open the exe.dev REPL in a floating terminal
Enter / Escape at a management confirmation	Confirm / cancel the named operation
R	Refresh
Escape in the list	Close the popout
Tab / Shift+Tab in the list	Switch to an adjacent Omarchy panel

While the finder has focus, letters type normally rather than triggering list shortcuts. Matching is case-insensitive and uses VM names only, not tags or comments. Characters must appear in order: mdb matches my-dev-box.

Exact matches rank above prefixes, then contiguous substrings, then scattered matches. Scattered matches favor consecutive characters and the start of a name or hyphen-separated segment, penalizing gaps and late starts. Ties sort by name. An empty or whitespace-only query restores tag grouping. Reopening clears the query. Navigation and actions always refer to the displayed results.

Settings

Choose what happens when you click a VM:

omarchy bar set cmk.exe-dev clickAction ssh       # default
omarchy bar set cmk.exe-dev clickAction browser
omarchy bar set cmk.exe-dev clickAction details

Enter in the list always opens details, regardless of this setting. S and B always launch SSH and browser respectively. If the API denies the chosen action, the plugin does not launch it or silently substitute another action.

Configure periodic refresh:

omarchy bar set cmk.exe-dev refreshIntervalSec 120

The default is 60 seconds; periodic refresh is clamped to at least 15 seconds and only runs while the popout is open. There is also an initial query when the widget loads and a refresh on opening. Overlapping refresh requests are coalesced.

Queries have an 8-second connection timeout and a 20-second total deadline, with forced termination after a further 2 seconds if needed. A successful response replaces the list. Failure leaves the previous list visible with a warning. VM metadata is not cached to disk by the plugin.

Update

omarchy plugin update cmk.exe-dev

Omarchy fetches upstream HEAD, shows the diff, and fast-forwards the checkout. Updates follow the repository's default branch, not release tags or the manifest version. Review updates before accepting them. Keep local edits on a separate branch; they can prevent a fast-forward update.

Release tags identify snapshots, but the standard install command is not pinned to a release or marketplace-reviewed commit. See SECURITY.md.

Disable or remove

omarchy plugin disable cmk.exe-dev
omarchy plugin remove cmk.exe-dev

Removal disables the plugin and deletes its Git checkout. Save any local changes first. It does not delete VMs or change your exe.dev account or SSH configuration.

Troubleshooting

• Authentication/host-key error: run ssh exe.dev ls --json in a terminal. Check the host key and that the desktop shell can use your SSH agent.
• Connection failure: the last successful list remains usable; press R to retry. The plugin never creates a VM automatically.
• Plugin missing: run omarchy plugin list, then omarchy plugin enable cmk.exe-dev if needed.
• Edits not appearing: try omarchy-shell shell rescanPlugins. If QML is still cached, use omarchy restart shell when convenient; this restarts the desktop shell, not your session.

Diagnostics are available through omarchy-shell cmk.exe-dev status. Its output can include VM names, your search text, and SSH error details. Redact those before sharing logs or filing an issue.

Development

node --test tests/*.test.cjs
omarchy plugin validate .
qmllint -I "$OMARCHY_PATH/shell" Widget.qml VmService.qml VmNavigation.qml VmDetail.qml ShortcutHint.qml

CI runs the dependency-free Node tests, manifest/repository contract checks, and whitespace checks. It does not run the plugin against a live desktop or account. Local QML linting requires the supported Omarchy/Quickshell imports; manifest validation alone cannot prove runtime compatibility.

See CONTRIBUTING.md for the manual desktop test matrix and release checklist, and CHANGELOG.md for release notes.

Security and scope

The plugin lists VMs, launches browser/SSH sessions and the lobby REPL, and can restart, pause/resume, or copy a VM after explicit confirmation. It does not delete, resize, unlock, or change sharing on VMs. Management requires current administration permission and uses a fixed allowlist of commands. Commands use argument arrays, not a local shell or the API's ssh_command string. VM names and SSH destinations are validated before launch, and server metadata is rendered as plain text.

Plugins are not sandboxed. These boundaries are implementation choices, not an isolation guarantee. See SECURITY.md for the threat model and private vulnerability reporting.

License

MIT, copyright Christian Kreiling. Omarchy and exe.dev names belong to their respective owners.

API references: SSH API · SSH destinations