Switchboard

A low-latency, multi-path, end-to-end encrypted tmux session router. Switchboard establishes virtual switched networks (VSNs) over overlay routers, purpose-built for high-trust remote CLI access.

Architecture

Nodes connect to tmux sessions; routers relay encrypted frames between them.

• Access node — publishes tmux sessions over the network
• Console — connects to remote tmux sessions
• Control — manages VSN configuration

Routers are blind relays — they forward SSH-encrypted traffic without seeing content. A single router binary supports three deployment modes:

Mode	Role
E (Edge-local)	Runs alongside a node for same-LAN setup between two machines
PE (Provider Edge)	Production router: connects nodes and peers with other routers
P (Provider Core)	Router-to-router only forwarding (theoretical — not yet built)

Nodes communicate end-to-end via SSH. Switchboard adds routing and network admission, not encryption.

Key Design Principles

• No direct node-to-node — all traffic flows through routers
• Timeslice framing — "the bus leaves on time, full or not." Each direction has its own clock; frames carry whatever bytes are ready when the tick fires
• Asymmetric half-channels — upstream (keystrokes: tiny, ordered, loss-intolerant) and downstream (terminal output: bursty, state-syncable) are handled independently
• Dual fastest-path forwarding with latency-based path selection

Status

Early development. The current MVP scope is nodes + E router on a single LAN — proving out the edge protocol and user experience before tackling multi-hop networking.

Installation

Homebrew

# stable
brew install arcavenae/tap/switchboard

# alpha channel (latest builds from develop)
brew install arcavenae/tap/switchboard-a

Both formulas can be installed side-by-side. Stable runs as switchboard, alpha as switchboard-a.

First stable release pending. No v* tag has shipped yet — until v0.1.0 publishes, only the alpha channel resolves; use switchboard-a and see releases.

mise

mise is a polyglot version manager. It reads a per-project mise.toml, pulls the exact signed binary from GitHub Releases, and verifies GitHub Artifact Attestations natively — no Homebrew tap required.

Stable:

mise use github:ArcavenAE/switchboard@latest
switchboard --version

First stable release pending. Until v0.1.0 ships, the command above resolves to the newest alpha in the interim. Once the first stable tag publishes, it will resolve to the stable channel.

Alpha channel (prereleases from develop) — add prerelease = true to opt in per-tool. Alpha binaries install as switchboard-a, mirroring the Homebrew formula, so stable and alpha can coexist:

# mise.toml
[tools]
"github:ArcavenAE/switchboard" = { version = "latest", prerelease = true }

mise install
switchboard-a --version

macOS troubleshooting — mise downloads over HTTP libraries that do not set com.apple.quarantine, so notarized binaries launch without a Gatekeeper prompt in the common case. If a quarantine-aware host (some IDEs, launchers, or file-manager copies) propagates the xattr into the mise install, clear it once:

xattr -d com.apple.quarantine "$(mise which switchboard-a)"

Build

Requires Go 1.25+ and just.

just build          # Build binary to bin/switchboard
just test           # Run tests
just test-race      # Run tests with race detector
just fmt            # Format with gofumpt
just lint           # Run golangci-lint
just build-all      # Cross-compile darwin/arm64, darwin/amd64, linux/amd64

# Run directly
just run

# Check version
./bin/switchboard --version

Project Structure

cmd/switchboard/    # Entry point
internal/           # Internal packages (not yet populated)
scripts/            # macOS packaging (app, dmg, pkg)
packaging/          # Info.plist for macOS app bundle
Formula/            # Homebrew formula template

License

MIT