Getting Started

Install Pane, connect to a server, and open your first terminal.

Prerequisites

Install

Download the latest release from the Releases page, unzip, and drag Pane.app to /Applications. Pane updates automatically via Sparkle — you'll get a notification when a new version is available.

Add a server

  1. Open Pane. The sidebar shows a Local server (your Mac) by default.
  2. Click the + button in the sidebar footer and choose Add Server.
  3. Fill in the connection details:
    • Host — hostname or IP address
    • Port — defaults to 22
    • Username
    • Authentication — password or an imported SSH key (RSA, Ed25519, ECDSA)
  4. Click Save. Pane validates the connection in real time — if the host key is new, you'll see a TOFU confirmation dialog. On success, the server appears in the sidebar.

Add a project

A project is just a directory on a server.

  1. Select a server in the sidebar.
  2. Click the + button and choose Add Project.
  3. Browse to an existing directory, or create a new one.
  4. The project appears in the sidebar tree. If the directory contains a pane.json, the project name and services are picked up automatically.

Open a terminal

Click a workspace under a project to open it. You'll see an empty pane with action buttons. Press ⌘T to create a new agent tab (launches Claude Code), or click the terminal icon in the tab bar for a plain terminal. Each tab is backed by its own tmux session on the server.

Split panes

Press ⌘D to split horizontally (left/right) or ⌘⇧D to split vertically (top/bottom). Navigate between panes with ⌘⌥ + arrow keys. Drag the divider between panes to resize.

First-run provisioning

On first connect, Pane deploys a small Rust daemon (pane-proxy) to ~/.pane/bin/ on the server. This happens automatically and takes a few seconds. The daemon handles project registry, port forwarding, services, file operations, and the browser SOCKS proxy. It's versioned and updated automatically when you update Pane.

Access your machines from anywhere

Use Tailscale to create a private network across all your devices. Once set up, you can SSH into your home Mac, office workstation, or cloud server from anywhere — no port forwarding or public IPs required. Pane works great with Tailscale: just add your machines by their Tailscale hostname or IP.

Cross-device sync

Your project structure, tabs, and split layout are stored in ~/.pane/server.json on each server. Connect from your Mac, your iPhone, or another Mac — they all see the same workspace state. Terminal sessions are tmux, so you can start work on one device and pick up exactly where you left off on another.