Optimizing Your Remote Development Environment

Tactic Remote works well out of the box, but targeted optimizations can significantly improve the experience — especially for developers who use it for hours daily or over slower network connections. This guide covers practical performance tuning across every layer of the stack.

Mac-Side Optimizations

Your Mac is the execution engine. Its configuration directly impacts how fast terminal output reaches your phone.

tmux Configuration

The default tmux configuration works, but these tweaks improve Tactic Remote's capture efficiency:

Add to your ~/.tmux.conf:

# Increase scrollback buffer (default: 2000 lines)
# Larger buffer means more history available after reconnection
set-option -g history-limit 10000
 
# Reduce escape-time for faster key processing
# Default 500ms is too slow for programmatic control
set-option -sg escape-time 10
 
# Enable focus events (helps with terminal state detection)
set-option -g focus-events on
 
# Set aggressive resize so tmux adapts to the smallest connected client
# This ensures the capture dimensions are predictable
set-window-option -g aggressive-resize on

After editing, reload the configuration:

tmux source-file ~/.tmux.conf

Mac Power Settings

If your Mac sleeps while you're away, Claude Code sessions persist (tmux keeps them alive), but the companion app's network listener pauses. Configure your Mac to prevent sleep during active sessions:

System Settings → Energy → Prevent automatic sleeping when the display is off — Enable this when running long Claude Code tasks.

Alternatively, use caffeinate from the terminal:

# Prevent sleep for 4 hours
caffeinate -t 14400 &

The Tactic Remote companion app will include a built-in "keep alive" toggle in an upcoming update.

Claude Code Performance

Claude Code's performance depends on Anthropic's API response time, which you can't control. But you can optimize what happens on your end:

Reduce context size. Claude Code performs better with focused project directories. If your monorepo is large, point sessions at specific packages rather than the root:

# Instead of: ~/projects/mega-monorepo
# Use: ~/projects/mega-monorepo/packages/api

Use .claudeignore to exclude irrelevant directories (node_modules, build artifacts, test fixtures) from Claude Code's file scanning. This reduces the time Claude spends understanding your codebase.

# .claudeignore
node_modules/
dist/
build/
.next/
coverage/
*.min.js

Network Optimizations

Network quality is the single biggest factor in Tactic Remote's responsiveness.

Local Network Mode

For the best experience, optimize your local network:

Use 5GHz Wi-Fi. Both your Mac and iPhone should connect to the 5GHz band, not 2.4GHz. 5GHz provides lower latency and higher throughput at the cost of reduced range.

Reduce network hops. Ideally, your Mac and iPhone are on the same access point. If your network has multiple access points (mesh network), devices on different access points communicate through the router, adding latency.

Check for interference. Common sources of Wi-Fi interference: microwave ovens, Bluetooth devices, neighboring networks on the same channel. Use a Wi-Fi analyzer app to identify and avoid congested channels.

Wired Mac connection. If possible, connect your Mac to Ethernet rather than Wi-Fi. This eliminates one wireless hop and reduces latency by 5-15ms.

Cloudflare Tunnel Mode

Tunnel latency depends on your distance to Cloudflare's nearest edge server and the quality of the path between your ISP and Cloudflare. Optimizations:

Choose a Cloudflare datacenter region that minimizes round-trip time. Cloudflare's cloudflared typically auto-selects, but you can verify:

cloudflared tunnel info claude-remote

Use QUIC protocol. Cloudflare's tunnel supports QUIC, which provides better performance over lossy connections (common on mobile networks):

# In your cloudflared config
protocol: quic

DNS resolution caching. On your iPhone, the DNS lookup for your tunnel's hostname can add 50-100ms to the first connection. Using a fast DNS resolver (1.1.1.1 or 8.8.8.8) helps.

Measuring Network Performance

Tactic Remote's companion app includes a diagnostics panel showing:

• Round-trip time (RTT): The time for a ping-pong between iPhone and Mac.
• Update delivery time: The time from terminal change to iPhone render.
• Reconnection frequency: How often the connection drops and recovers.

If RTT consistently exceeds 100ms on local network, investigate your network configuration. For Cloudflare Tunnel, RTT under 200ms is typical and acceptable.

For detailed network diagnostics, see our Connection and Latency Diagnostics guide.

iPhone-Side Optimizations

Reduce Data Usage

On cellular connections, minimize data transfer:

Lower terminal streaming resolution. In Tactic Remote settings, you can reduce the streaming update frequency from 100ms (default) to 250ms or 500ms. This sends fewer updates per second with minimal perceptible difference for most tasks.

Disable syntax highlighting on cellular. Syntax highlighting requires additional processing of terminal output. Disabling it on cellular reduces data processing and saves battery.

Battery Optimization

Tactic Remote's battery impact is primarily from:

1. Network activity (polling for terminal updates)
2. Screen rendering (updating the terminal view)
3. Push notification handling

Use Low Power Mode strategically. iOS Low Power Mode reduces background activity, which can delay terminal updates and notifications. We recommend keeping it off during active debugging but enabling it for passive monitoring of long-running tasks.

Turn off auto-brightness. If you're monitoring a terminal in a dark environment, the screen at minimum brightness uses significantly less power than auto-brightness.

Lock and rely on notifications. For long-running tasks where you don't need to watch the terminal, lock your phone and rely on push notifications for completion and approval events. This drops battery consumption to near zero.

Accessibility Settings

Tactic Remote respects iOS accessibility settings:

Dynamic Type: Terminal text scales with your system text size preference. If you find terminal text too small, increase the system text size in Settings → Display & Brightness → Text Size.

Bold Text: Enabling bold text system-wide makes terminal output easier to scan, especially for code with subtle syntax differences.

Reduce Motion: If enabled, Tactic Remote skips transition animations, which slightly reduces battery usage and improves perceived performance.

Performance Benchmarks

After applying optimizations, expect these performance characteristics:

The improvements from optimization are incremental but compound — especially over multi-hour sessions where battery savings and reduced latency meaningfully improve the experience.

Troubleshooting Performance Issues

Terminal feels sluggish: Check RTT in diagnostics. If >100ms on local network, it's a network issue, not a Tactic Remote issue. If RTT is fine but rendering feels slow, try disabling syntax highlighting.

Frequent reconnections: This usually indicates Wi-Fi instability. Check signal strength and consider moving closer to your access point or switching to 5GHz.

High battery drain: Ensure you're not keeping the terminal view active on-screen continuously. Lock your phone during passive monitoring.

Mac companion using high CPU: This typically occurs during rapid terminal output (compilation, large test suites). It's normal and temporary — CPU usage drops to near zero when output settles.

For the complete performance tuning reference, see our Connection and Latency Diagnostics documentation.