043bebb7bc docs: add Coder Desktop stale-tunnel recovery and improve macOS log capture (#26735)
## What

Adds a **Recovering from a stale tunnel** section to the Coder Desktop
user guide, with separate macOS and Windows procedures, and tightens the
existing macOS log-collection instructions.

## Why

Users in the field have hit a state where Coder Desktop's menu bar /
tray shows **Coder Connect** as enabled but the embedded tunnel is no
longer working:

* `workspace.coder` fails to resolve (`No such host`), or
* DNS returns stale `fd60:627a:a42b::/48` addresses that no longer
route, causing `coder ssh`, file sync, and the directory picker to hang.

Related issues:

* coder/coder#26669 — `ExistsViaCoderConnect` false positives when Coder
Desktop has stale DNS
* coder/coder-desktop-windows#171 — Tray reports Coder Connect as
healthy while tunnel/DNS is broken

Until the underlying state-management gap is fixed in the apps, the docs
should give users (and support) a safe, repeatable way to recover
without rebooting.

## Changes

`docs/user-guides/desktop/index.md`:

1. **New "Recovering from a stale tunnel" section** under
Troubleshooting:
* **macOS:** stop the VPN configuration with `scutil --nc stop`, quit
the app via `osascript`, restart the helper daemon in place with
`launchctl kickstart -k system/com.coder.Coder-Desktop.Helper`, flush
DNS caches, then relaunch.
* Includes a warning to **not** use `launchctl bootout`, which removes
the daemon from launchd's system domain entirely and is not
re-bootstrapped on app relaunch.
* Includes a verification step using the built-in sentinel hostname
`is.coder--connect--enabled--right--now.coder` (defined in
`tailnet/conn.go` as `IsCoderConnectEnabledFmtString`) so users don't
need a workspace name to confirm the tunnel is healthy.
* Uses `dig @fd60:627a:a42b::53` (explicit server) and `dscacheutil -q
host -a name` because plain `dig` does not respect the macOS system
resolver.
* **Windows:** stop the app and `Coder Desktop` service, flush DNS,
restart, then verify the NRPT rule and Wintun adapter. Notes that
`ipconfig /flushdns` does not reset the embedded resolver and that
filtering agents (e.g., Zscaler) may still shadow `.coder` lookups.
2. **macOS log-collection improvements:**
* Switch the predicate from `subsystem == "com.coder.Coder-Desktop"` to
`subsystem BEGINSWITH "com.coder.Coder-Desktop"` so the export captures
the app, helper daemon, and network extension (which all log under
prefixed subsystems).
* Add a `log stream` example for live tailing while reproducing an
issue.

## Verification

* `npx markdownlint-cli2 docs/user-guides/desktop/index.md` — 0 errors.
* macOS recovery steps were validated end-to-end on a real install (the
`kickstart -k` form, in particular, was confirmed to restart the helper
without breaking the install, unlike `bootout`).

---

Created on behalf of @mdanter

---------

Co-authored-by: blink-so[bot] <211532188+blink-so[bot]@users.noreply.github.com>
Co-authored-by: Atif Ali <atif@coder.com>
Co-authored-by: Nick Vigilante <nickvigilante@users.noreply.github.com>
Co-authored-by: Matyas Danter <mdanter@gmail.com>
2026-08-14 12:31:04 -04:00
2022-04-04 11:55:06 -05:00

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Self-Hosted Cloud Development Environments and AI Agents

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Quickstart | Docs | Why Coder | Premium

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Coder is a self-hosted platform for cloud development environments and AI coding agents. Workspaces are defined with Terraform, connected through a secure Wireguard® tunnel, and automatically shut down when not used. Coder Agents runs a native AI coding agent whose loop executes in the control plane on your infrastructure, with no API keys in workspaces.

  • Define cloud development environments in Terraform
    • EC2 VMs, Kubernetes Pods, Docker Containers, etc.
  • Automatically shutdown idle resources to save on costs
  • Onboard developers in seconds instead of days
  • Delegate coding work to AI agents on your infrastructure
    • Bring any model (Anthropic, OpenAI, Google, Bedrock, self-hosted)
    • No LLM credentials in workspaces, user identity on every action
    • Centralized model governance, cost tracking, and audit logging

Coder platform showing templates and a running workspace

Quickstart

The most convenient way to try Coder is to install it on your local machine and experiment with provisioning cloud development environments using Docker (works on Linux, macOS, and Windows).

# First, install Coder
curl -L https://coder.com/install.sh | sh

# Start the Coder server (caches data in ~/.cache/coder)
coder server

# Navigate to http://localhost:3000 to create your initial user,
# create a Docker template and provision a workspace

Install

The easiest way to install Coder is to use the install script for Linux and macOS. For Windows, use the latest ..._installer.exe file from GitHub Releases.

curl -L https://coder.com/install.sh | sh

You can run the install script with --dry-run to see the commands that will be used to install without executing them. Run the install script with --help for additional flags.

See install for additional methods.

Once installed, you can start a production deployment with a single command:

# Automatically sets up an external access URL on *.try.coder.app
coder server

# Requires a PostgreSQL instance (version 13 or higher) and external access URL
coder server --postgres-url <url> --access-url <url>

Use coder --help to get a list of flags and environment variables. See the install guides for a complete tutorial.

Documentation

Browse the documentation or visit a specific section below:

  • Workspaces: Workspaces contain the IDEs, dependencies, and configuration information needed for software development
  • Templates: Templates are written in Terraform and describe the infrastructure for workspaces
  • Coder Agents: Delegate coding work to AI agents running on your self-hosted infrastructure
  • Administration: Learn how to operate Coder
  • Premium: Learn about paid features built for large teams
  • IDEs: Connect your existing editor to a workspace

Support

Feel free to open an issue if you have questions, run into bugs, or have a feature request.

Join our Discord to provide feedback on in-progress features and chat with the community using Coder!

Integrations

New integrations are always in progress. Open an issue to request one. Contributions are welcome in any official or community repository.

Official

Community

Contributing

New contributors are always welcome. If you are new to the Coder codebase, see the contribution guide to get started.

Hiring

Apply on the careers page if you are interested in joining the team.

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