Cline as your coding agent

Cline is an open-source coding agent. Its CLI brings the same agent to the terminal. This guide installs it in a workspace, so it runs on your server and keeps working after you close the terminal.

You need: a workspace — see getting started.

Before you start: machine, skills, workspace

curl -fsSL https://mydevmachine.sh/install.sh | sh
devmachine setup
devmachine skills add
devmachine workspaces new acme
devmachine sync

Already have a machine? Skip setup. Already have the workspace? Skip the last two. See getting started for what each command does.

By hand

1. Add the package

devmachine packages add cline --workspace acme
devmachine sync

Cline ships only through npm, so the package needs Node. packages add adds the dev package too, which brings it. sync installs cline into the workspace’s own ~/.local, so a Node upgrade does not remove it.

2. Sign in, once

devmachine login cline --workspace acme

This runs cline auth in a real terminal. Pick your Cline account, a ChatGPT subscription, or your own provider’s API key.

3. Start working

devmachine ssh acme
cd ~/dev/my-project
cline

You land inside tmux, so cline keeps running when you close the terminal.

Skills

Cline reads its skills from ~/.cline/skills, not from ~/.agents/skills. Devmachine links each skill there for you: in a workspace with this package, and on your computer with devmachine skills add --agent cline. See agent skills.

With your agent

Open a session on your own computer (devmachine skills add taught it the CLI) and say:

Install the Cline CLI in my devmachine workspace acme.

The agent adds the cline package and runs sync. Signing in stays yours: devmachine login cline --workspace acme opens a real terminal for you to finish it.

Check it: devmachine run --workspace acme -- cline --version prints a version. Then start cline in a project folder and ask it about the code.

Source: Cline CLI, Cline CLI reference