Getting Started¶
CIAB (Claude In A Box) is an open-source control plane for coding agents. Manage Claude Code, Codex, Gemini CLI, and Cursor as isolated sandboxes — via CLI, REST API, desktop app, or any web browser.
Install in 10 Seconds¶
This downloads the pre-built binary for your platform (macOS or Linux) and installs it to /usr/local/bin. See Installation for other options.
What You Can Do¶
- Create sandboxes — Spin up isolated agents (Claude Code, Codex, Gemini CLI, or Cursor) as local processes or containers
- Chat with agents — Send prompts and receive streaming responses, including tool use visualization
- Access from any device — Open sandboxes from your phone, tablet, or any browser via the built-in web gateway
- Execute commands — Run shell commands inside sandboxes with streaming stdout/stderr
- Manage files — Upload, download, list, and delete files in any sandbox
- Manage credentials — Store encrypted API keys and OAuth tokens
- Remote access — Expose sandboxes via bore, Cloudflare Tunnel, ngrok, or frp
Prerequisites¶
- macOS or Linux — For running the CIAB server
- Agent API key — At least one of:
ANTHROPIC_API_KEY,OPENAI_API_KEY, orGOOGLE_API_KEY
That's it. No Docker, no Rust toolchain, no containers required — CIAB runs agents as local processes by default.
Want containers?
For Docker or OpenSandbox backends, see Deployment.
Next Steps¶
- Installation — Install via script, binary download, or build from source
- Quickstart — Create your first sandbox in 5 minutes
- Mobile Access — Access sandboxes from your phone