# PDR 005: Run persistent agent work from personal devices

- HTML version: https://robbiepalmer.me/projects/homelab/pdrs/005-run-persistent-agent-work-from-personal-devices
- Project: Home Lab
- Status: Accepted
- Opened: 2026-08-02
- Decided: 2026-08-02

## Context

Coding agents are most useful when repositories, credentials, tools, browser
state, and prior sessions are already available. A laptop that sleeps when
closed cannot host work started from a phone. Provider-specific remote
environments also repeat setup and divide work across separate interfaces.

Several model providers and subscriptions are useful because their strengths,
allowances, and availability differ. That diversity should not require a new
workflow for each harness.

## Decision

Run coding agents on prepared, persistent development hosts and control them
from personal devices through one mobile-friendly interface. Preserve the
repository, worktree, tools, credentials, session state, and review workflow on
the host so remote interaction does not rebuild the environment for every job.

Support several coding harnesses and provider accounts behind that interface.
Keep their allowances and authentication separate, while presenting thread
state, attention, diffs, commits, pushes, and pull requests in one workflow.

## Consequences

Agent work can continue from a phone or laptop without moving the development
environment onto that device. The persistent host becomes a security and
availability boundary because it holds powerful credentials and mutable work.
Provider diversity also adds authentication and update work.

## Evaluation

The workflow succeeds when a personal device can resume an existing thread,
start work with any configured harness, inspect its change, and hand it off as
a pull request without rebuilding the repository environment.

## Migration note

This record extracts the persistent, multi-provider agent workflow from the
original narrative and ADRs 002 through 004. Those ADRs retain the individual
harness and orchestration choices. Later local and cloud workstation ADRs
retain their host architecture.

## Related records

- Project: [Home Lab](https://robbiepalmer.me/projects/homelab.md)
- Implemented by ADR: [ADR 002: Grok Build](https://robbiepalmer.me/projects/homelab/adrs/002-grok-build.md)
- Implemented by ADR: [ADR 003: OpenCode](https://robbiepalmer.me/projects/homelab/adrs/003-opencode.md)
- Implemented by ADR: [ADR 004: t3-code as the agent orchestrator](https://robbiepalmer.me/projects/homelab/adrs/004-t3-code.md)
- Implemented by ADR: [ADR 021: Cloud remote-development plane](https://robbiepalmer.me/projects/homelab/adrs/021-cloud-remote-development-plane.md)

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