Bleat Support

Bleat is a remote for Herdr: it shows your sessions, workspaces and agents, and lets you read and answer them from your iPhone, iPad or Apple Watch. If something is not working, please write to help+bleat@partof.team and tell us what you were doing. It helps enormously if you say which device you were using, and whether the computer is a Mac or runs Linux.

What you need

• A Mac or Linux computer with Herdr installed, and SSH (Remote Login on a Mac) turned on.
• The bleat command on that computer, to show the pairing code. On a Mac, with Homebrew: brew install partofinc/tap/bleat. On Linux (64-bit ARM, including Raspberry Pi 4 and newer, or x86_64), or a Mac without Homebrew: curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/partofinc/bleat-apple/main/Scripts/install.sh | sh
• A way for your device to reach the computer: the same network, or a VPN such as Tailscale when you are away.

Pairing

• On the computer, run bleat pair. It shows a QR code in the terminal.
• In Bleat, tap Pair a host and point the camera at it. If the terminal is too small for a code, bleat pair prints a link instead. Copy it to your device, paste it into the same screen, then tap Pair with this link.
• The code works once and expires after a few minutes. If it runs out, run bleat pair again.
• To pair a second device, open the computer in a device that is already paired and choose Pair another device. No terminal needed.

It cannot reach my computer

• On the same network: check that Bleat is allowed to use the local network, in Settings › Privacy & Security › Local Network.
• Away from home: your device needs a route to the computer, such as Tailscale running on both. If Tailscale was set up after pairing, Bleat picks up the new address the next time it connects on the home network.
• A computer's settings in Bleat list the addresses it tries, and you can add one by hand, for example a port forward.

Typing into a pane

• Herdr lets one device control a pane at a time. Opening a terminal in Bleat takes control of that pane, so if someone is typing in it at the computer, their typing stops reaching it. Bleat holds the pane only while its terminal is on screen, and gives it back when you leave the terminal.
• Above the keyboard are the arrow keys, Esc and Return, which move through an agent's prompts and approvals, and a menu of shortcuts such as ⌃C, Tab and ⇧Tab.

Apple Watch

• The watch shows the computers paired on your iPhone, and goes through the iPhone to reach them. Keep the iPhone nearby with Bleat installed.
• Pairing and the terminal are on the iPhone and iPad only.

Unpairing

• Unpairing a computer in Bleat removes your device's key from it, so the device can no longer connect. This needs the computer to be reachable.
• If it cannot be reached — it is off, sold or rebuilt — Bleat offers to forget it without removing the key. The key then still works on that computer until you remove it there.
• From the computer, bleat keys list shows every paired device and bleat keys revoke removes one, even if you no longer have the device.

Source code

Bleat and the bleat command are open source, under the MIT licence: github.com/partofinc/bleat-apple. The pairing and key handling are described in detail there.

Privacy

Bleat collects nothing. See the privacy policy.