CLI Reference

Brev Connect Commands

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Use these commands to set up Brev Connect on external hardware, manage SSH access, and deregister machines.

For connectivity commands (brev shell and brev port-forward) that also work with Brev Connect, see Connectivity.

brev register

Register a Linux machine with your Brev organization. This installs the NetBird mesh VPN, profiles the machine’s hardware, and registers it with the Brev API.

$brev register -n <name>

Flags

FlagShortDescription
--name-nDisplay name for the machine (e.g., “My DGX Spark”)
--org-oOrganization to register with (defaults to active org)

What it does

  1. Installs the NetBird VPN agent via https://pkgs.netbird.io/install.sh
  2. Collects a hardware profile — GPUs (NVML), CPU, RAM, storage, OS, interconnects
  3. Registers the machine with the Brev API

Example

$# Register with a name
$brev register -n "My DGX Spark"
$
$# Register to a specific organization
$brev register --name "Lab Workstation" --org my-team

Requires sudo access. Linux only. The NetBird agent is installed as a systemd service.

brev enable-ssh

Enable SSH access on a registered machine for the current user. Prompts for the SSH port to use.

$brev enable-ssh

Flags

No flags. Prompts interactively for the SSH port.

Details

  • Grants SSH access to yourself (a “reflexive grant”)
  • Checks if the SSH daemon (ssh or sshd) is running and warns if it’s not active
  • Must be run on a registered machine

Example

$$ brev enable-ssh
$Enter SSH port: 22
$SSH enabled successfully.

brev grant-ssh

Grant SSH access to another member of your organization. Presents an interactive selector to choose the user.

$brev grant-ssh

Flags

No flags. Interactive user selector. Prompts for SSH port.

Example

$$ brev grant-ssh
$Select a user to grant SSH access:
$> alice@example.com
$  bob@example.com

Requires SSH to already be enabled on the device (run brev enable-ssh first). This command removes ~/.brev/credentials.json before granting access to prevent the other user from seeing the device owner’s auth tokens.

brev revoke-ssh

Revoke SSH access from a user. Presents an interactive selector showing Brev-managed SSH keys with a key preview and associated user.

$brev revoke-ssh

Flags

No flags. Interactive key selector.

How it works

Revocation is two-stage:

  1. Removes the SSH key from the local machine
  2. Sends an RPC to the Brev server to revoke server-side access

Example

$$ brev revoke-ssh
$Select a key to revoke:
$> SHA256:abc123... (alice@example.com)
$  SHA256:def456... (bob@example.com)

brev deregister

Remove the current machine from Brev. Performs a full cleanup.

$brev deregister

Flags

No flags. Prompts for confirmation.

What it does

  1. Unregisters the machine from the Brev server
  2. Removes SSH keys
  3. Uninstalls the NetBird agent
  4. Deletes /etc/brev/device_registration.json

Example

$$ brev deregister
$Are you sure you want to deregister this machine? [y/N]: y
$Machine deregistered successfully.

Using shell and port-forward with Brev Connect

The brev shell and brev port-forward commands work with Brev Connect machines. If a workspace with the given name isn’t found, Brev automatically falls back to looking up connected external machines.

$# SSH into a Brev Connect machine
$brev shell my-dgx-spark
$
$# Forward a port from a Brev Connect machine
$brev port-forward my-dgx-spark --port 8888:8888

Port forwarding supports TCP and UDP protocols via the OpenPort RPC.