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Release 0.3.37 July 3, 2026

Mechanics 0.3.37: workspace tunnels over plain ssh -L

Private workspace Services and Pods are now reachable through stock OpenSSH local forwarding, with destination authorization, resolution, and audit kept under the SSH key identity boundary.

Not everything a workspace runs should get a public route. Databases, staging instances, admin ports, and half-finished services want native TCP access from a laptop or an agent sandbox without becoming an HTTPS endpoint. Mechanics 0.3.37 gives them exactly that, using a tool every client already has: OpenSSH local port forwarding.

tunnel to a workspace service 

ssh -N -L 5432:mydb-rw.x-alice:5432 mechanics.run
psql -h 127.0.0.1 -p 5432 -U app mydb

Stock ssh -L, constrained destinations

Mechanics now handles direct-tcpip channels itself. The destination is parsed as a Kubernetes DNS name (<service>.<namespace>, <service>.<namespace>.svc, or <pod>.<namespace>.pod) and authorized against the SSH public key before anything is dialed. The namespace must be a workspace owned by the connecting account. IP literals, foreign namespaces, headless Services, and reverse forwarding are rejected, and Mechanics resolves the target itself instead of dialing whatever address the client supplied.

This is a separate capability from the read-only user kubeconfig, which still denies pods/portforward. Tunnels never expose a public TCP endpoint. They exist only for the lifetime of the SSH connection.

Connect helpers print the command

Nobody should have to remember the destination grammar. app connect and addon connect print a ready-to-paste forward for the app's live instance Service or the addon's TCP endpoint (postgres to <name>-rw:5432, valkey to 6379, NATS to 4222), plus a native client hint.

helper output 

ssh -T mechanics.run -- app -a myapp connect
ssh -T mechanics.run -- addon -a mydb connect --local-port 15432
# prints: ssh -f -N -o ServerAliveInterval=30 \
#   -o ExitOnForwardFailure=yes \
#   -L 15432:mydb-rw.x-alice:5432 mechanics.run

Tunnels are audited like commands

Every tunnel attempt, allowed or denied, is recorded separately from command audit events: target, outcome, error, byte counts, and SSH metadata. Operators inspect them with mechanics audit tunnels. Unknown keys get a signup hint instead of a silent rejection, and the SSH username stays what it always was in Mechanics: metadata, never identity.

Private things stay private. Reaching them takes one ssh -L that Mechanics authorizes, resolves, and audits.