Remote Code Server and Cloudflare Tunnel

A complete setup for hosting a browser-accessible VS Code instance on Fedora via code-server, exposed securely to any remote machine or device using a free Cloudflare Tunnel.

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1. Architecture Overview

• code-server: Runs locally on 127.0.0.1:8080 as a systemd user service.
• cloudflared: Connects the local port to Cloudflare edge network via HTTP/2 tunnel, providing public HTTPS without opening router ports or exposing static public IPs.
• systemd --user with linger: Keeps both services running continuously in the background even after logging out.

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2. Service Configuration

code-server

• Config path: ~/.config/code-server/config.yaml
• Settings:

  bind-addr: 127.0.0.1:8080
  auth: password
  password: <your_password>
  cert: false

cloudflared systemd Service

• Service path: ~/.config/systemd/user/cloudflared.service
• Definition:

  [Unit]
  Description=Cloudflare Tunnel for code-server
  After=network.target code-server.service
  Requires=code-server.service
   
  [Service]
  Type=simple
  ExecStart=/usr/local/bin/cloudflared --no-autoupdate tunnel --protocol http2 --url http://127.0.0.1:8080
  Restart=always
  RestartSec=5s
   
  [Install]
  WantedBy=default.target

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3. Remote Access Guide

Quick Access via Browser

1. Find the current tunnel URL:

   journalctl --user -u cloudflared -n 30 --no-pager | grep -o 'https://.*\.trycloudflare\.com'

2. Open the URL in any web browser on another PC, tablet, or phone.
3. Enter the configured password from ~/.config/code-server/config.yaml.

Upgrading to a Custom Domain (100% Free)

1. Go to Cloudflare Zero Trust Dashboard $\to$ Networks $\to$ Tunnels.
2. Create a named tunnel and route code.yourdomain.com to http://localhost:8080.
3. Install connector token on Fedora:

   sudo cloudflared service install <TUNNEL_TOKEN>

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4. Useful Operations & Troubleshooting

Task	Command
Check code-server status	systemctl --user status code-server
Restart code-server	systemctl --user restart code-server
Check cloudflared status	systemctl --user status cloudflared
View live tunnel logs / URL	journalctl --user -u cloudflared -f
Kill stale port 8080 process	kill -9 $(pgrep -f code-server)