Web‑Based Collaborative Terminal via Cloudflare Tunnel

This repository provides a simple web terminal that runs on any VPS and can be exposed permanently through a Cloudflare Tunnel. It works similarly to sshx.io, letting you share a browser‑based terminal with anyone via a unique URL.

How it works

1. ttyd (or gotty) runs a web server that serves a terminal over WebSockets.
2. cloudflared creates a tunnel from a sub‑domain of your Cloudflare‑managed domain to the local ttyd port.
3. The resulting public URL can be shared, and anyone can interact with the shell in real time.

Features

• 🎯 Instant sharing – start the service and get a URL instantly.
• 🖥️ Browser‑based terminal – no SSH client required on the viewer side.
• 🔐 End‑to‑end encryption – Cloudflare terminates TLS; the tunnel is encrypted.
• 📡 Works behind NAT/firewalls – no inbound ports needed.
• 🛠️ Easy to run as a Docker container or a systemd service.

Prerequisites

• A Cloudflare account with a zone (domain) added.
• cloudflared installed on the VPS (see Cloudflare docs).
• Docker installed (optional – you can also run ttyd directly).

Quick start (Docker)

# 1. Install cloudflared (Debian/Ubuntu example)
curl -L https://github.com/cloudflare/cloudflared/releases/latest/download/cloudflared-linux-amd64.deb -o cloudflared.deb
sudo dpkg -i cloudflared.deb

# 2. Clone this repo and build the Docker image
git clone https://github.com/TrivCodez/sshx-collaborative-terminal.git
cd sshx-collaborative-terminal
docker build -t web-terminal .

# 3. Run the container (exposes ttyd on 7681 inside the container)
#    Replace <YOUR_TUNNEL_TOKEN> with the token you get from `cloudflared tunnel create`
cloudflared tunnel run --url http://localhost:7681 &

docker run -d --name web-terminal -p 7681:7681 web-terminal

After cloudflared starts, it will print a URL like https://<random>.trycloudflare.com. Share that URL – anyone opening it gets a full interactive shell.

Running without Docker (direct binary)

# Install ttyd (Ubuntu example)
sudo apt-get install -y ttyd

# Start ttyd on port 7681
ttyd -p 7681 bash &

# Start the Cloudflare tunnel
cloudflared tunnel --url http://localhost:7681

Systemd service (recommended for production)

Create /etc/systemd/system/web-terminal.service:

[Unit]
Description=Web terminal with ttyd and Cloudflare tunnel
After=network.target

[Service]
# Start ttyd
ExecStart=/usr/bin/ttyd -p 7681 bash
# Start cloudflared (replace <TOKEN> with your tunnel token)
ExecStartPost=/usr/local/bin/cloudflared tunnel --url http://localhost:7681
Restart=always
User=root
WorkingDirectory=/root

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

sudo systemctl daemon-reload
sudo systemctl enable --now web-terminal.service

Security considerations

• The terminal runs as the user you launch the service as – avoid running as root in production.
• Anyone with the URL can execute commands; treat the URL as a secret.
• Cloudflare terminates TLS, but the underlying ttyd connection is plain HTTP – the tunnel encrypts it.
• Use cloudflared access policies (Zero Trust) to restrict who can reach the tunnel if needed.

License

MIT – see the LICENSE file.