# Drive a box remotely

Any control command can target one of your relay-connected boxes from anywhere, by the base domain piper login printed. Requests travel relay → tunnel → box; your relay credential never reaches the box.

piper --remote ab12-alice.public.getpiper.dev list
piper --remote ab12-alice.public.getpiper.dev status  # box up? what's deployed?
export PIPER_REMOTE=ab12-alice.public.getpiper.dev    # or set it once
piper deploy blog --path .

Requests travel relay → tunnel → box: the CLI authenticates to the relay with the account credential piper login saved in ~/.piper/piper/config.json (mode 0600), and the relay swaps it for the box's own token — your relay credential never reaches the box, and the box still enforces its own auth. The --remote flag overrides PIPER_REMOTE; login is inherently local and rejects --remote.

Bare piper --remote <base-domain> opens the TUI against that box.