Solution · Cursor + remote agent

Keep your editor. Move the agent.

Cursor on your laptop is unbeatable for in-the-editor work. Cursor's CLI on an Ellul workstation gives you the same agent without the lid problem. They compose; you don't have to choose.

Updated

Cursor's editor experience is the best in the category in April 2026. Inline completions are instant. Command-K is reflexive. Codebase indexing means the agent panel knows about types and call sites without you re-explaining. The editing experience is a hundred small things that you feel a hundred times a day.

The editor is the keeper. The agent panel is the part that ties Cursor to your laptop.

What Ellul changes

The shape of the change:

  1. Editor stays local. Inline completions, command-K, codebase indexing, polish; all of it. You don't lose any of the keyboard ergonomics you actually use.
  2. Agent moves to Ellul. Cursor's CLI runs on a persistent workstation. Multiple sessions in parallel, real-credential operations behind a passkey, MCP servers running long-lived in the same workstation.
  3. Both at once when it matters. Cursor for inline work. Ellul-hosted CLI for the eight-hour refactor that you don't want sitting on your battery.

A typical day

Mornings, you're at the keyboard with Cursor open on your laptop. Inline completions, command-K, codebase indexing: the editor does what it's best at.

Around lunch you queue an agent task: "Refactor the entire job-runner module to use the new MCP transport." Instead of running it on your laptop and waiting, you fire it off on Ellul. Cursor stays open for the rest of your day-job. You shut your laptop and walk to lunch.

You come back. The agent has opened a draft PR. You review it on your phone. Tap your passkey. Merged.

That's the shape.

What you don't lose

What you gain

  • Always-on agent. Cursor's CLI keeps running on Ellul when your laptop sleeps.
  • Parallel agents. Two or three Cursor CLI sessions on different branches, in different sandboxes, with no port collisions.
  • Passkey-gated production access. git push, vercel deploy, psql production: pause until you tap.
  • Server-side credential vault. Your tokens never sit in ~/.aws on the agent's machine. They're brokered through a separate process the agent can't read.
  • Phone access. Open your phone in the subway. Approve a PR. Walk off the train.

Setup

  1. Sign up for Ellul (Hobby $20/mo or Pro $50/mo).
  2. Provision a workstation. Cursor's CLI is pre-installed.
  3. Connect a passkey (FIDO2 from any device).
  4. Open a session. Cursor stays on your laptop; the CLI runs on the workstation.

When this isn't right

If your work is genuinely inline-only (short refactors, one-shot completions, no eight-hour runs, no production credentials) you don't need Ellul. Cursor on your laptop is enough.

If you spend any meaningful time waiting for the agent to finish, or your agent ever needs to touch real infrastructure, the composition is the answer.

See also

Do I have to give up Cursor on my laptop?

No. Cursor stays where it is for inline completions, command-K, and codebase indexing. Cursor's CLI on Ellul handles unattended runs and parallel agents. They compose.

Will Cursor's agent panel work against an Ellul workstation?

The agent panel is local-first. Cursor's CLI works against any environment. Ellul provisions a workstation, you point the CLI at it, and the agent runs there.

Is this just SSH to a server?

No. Ellul ships passkey-gated privileged actions, server-side credential vault, per-agent sandboxes, and read-only peering between agents. The workstation is opinionated for agent work, not generic Linux.

What about my codebase context?

Each Ellul workstation persists across sessions: your repo, your installed packages, your in-progress branches. You don't re-clone every time you start a session.

Pricing if I'm already paying for Cursor?

Cursor stays on your laptop ($20/mo). Add an Ellul workstation ($20 to $50/mo) for unattended work. Most senior engineers we talk to pay for both. They pay for different things.