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Remote ADB

Remote ADB gives your engineers the Android Debug Bridge on a device wherever it is: in a store, in a vehicle, on mobile data. They use their usual adb and Android Studio; the device needs no open port and no VPN.

With the ohr command line tool

Section titled “With the ohr command line tool”

The ohr tool signs your engineer in, opens the session, and runs the tunnel:

Terminal window
ohr login                          # once: approve in the OhrTech Portal
ohr devices                        # find the device
ohr adb connect A0000A00042        # tunnel open until Ctrl-C; adb and Android Studio see the device
ohr shell A0000A00042 getprop ro.build.fingerprint
ohr adb A0000A00042 -- logcat -d   # any one adb command

A device is named by its ID, IMEI or serial number.

How it stays private

Section titled “How it stays private”
  • End-to-end encrypted. adb traffic is compressed and encrypted on the device and only decrypted by the engineer’s ohr tool. OhrTech’s relay passes it along without being able to read it.
  • The device is verified. The tool checks the device’s handshake against the device’s attested key before sending anything.
  • One engineer’s key. The device’s adbd accepts only the ADB key of the engineer who opened the session, and only on that session.
  • Permissioned and recorded. Opening a session needs RemoteAdb on the device. Every session is recorded: when it opened, how it ended and how much data it carried.

The API calls

Section titled “The API calls”

The ohr tool uses these, and you can use them to show and end sessions in your own tools:

Call
GET /v1/devices/{deviceId}/adb-sessions The device’s sessions: when, status, how they ended, bytesUp and bytesDown
POST /v1/devices/{deviceId}/adb-sessions Open one (the ohr tool does this, with its keys)
GET /v1/adb-sessions/{sessionId} One session
DELETE /v1/adb-sessions/{sessionId} End it

A session lasts at most 12 hours. status is pending, device-connected, active, closed or failed. Every call needs RemoteAdb on the device.

The device must have remote ADB allowed: the remote_adb.enabled setting.