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Agents

Give each coding agent its own sandbox, a token scoped to it, and a signed record of what it did.

An agent works in a sandbox the way an engineer works in production: it deploys, signs in, reads mail, runs jobs and reads logs. It holds a sandbox token, which reaches one sandbox and nothing else, and every call it makes is recorded against the person it acts for.

Hand over a sandbox

Create the sandbox with your project token, then give the agent the sandbox token that parity up prints once:

Terminal
parity up --sandbox fix-invite-expiry --ttl 4h
# → "token": "pst_t7acme-fix-invite-expiry_…"

Start the agent with that token. With a sandbox token, every command targets its sandbox, and parity up updates it in place:

Terminal
PARITY_API=https://api.parity.ninja PARITY_TOKEN=pst_t7acme-fix-invite-expiry_… claude

Or connect it over MCP, remote or local; see MCP:

Terminal
claude mcp add parity -e PARITY_API=https://api.parity.ninja -e PARITY_TOKEN=pst_… -- parity mcp

What the agent does

A typical loop, in CLI or MCP terms:

  1. parity up / sandbox_sync after each change, and sandbox_status until ready.
  2. Drive the app through its public URL, https://web--fix-invite-expiry--t7acme.env.parity.ninja.
  3. Create users with parity auth user create ana@acme.test --org acme --role admin, or through the app's own sign-up, and sign in with a one-time link from parity signin ana@acme.test.
  4. Wait for mail with parity inbox wait --to bob@acme.test and follow its links and codes.
  5. Run jobs with parity run digest, and debug with parity logs and parity exec.
  6. Attach evidence with parity proof add and export a signed bundle with parity proof export.

Every command prints JSON. Over MCP, no call waits more than about 50 seconds; a tool still waiting returns a next hint.

What a sandbox token cannot do

ActionSandbox token
Use, update and destroy its own sandboxYes
Reach another sandboxNo: wrong_sandbox before any lookup
Create sandboxesNo
Promote, freeze, change members or domainsNo
Reveal secret values, reach the production database, exec in productionNo, whatever the person's role
Widen the egress allowlistNo: a host the promoted manifest doesn't list stays blocked
parity execOnly when sandbox.agent_exec is true (the default)

An agent never has more access than the person it acts for. See Permissions.

Proof for reviewers

parity proof export writes a zip with the files the agent attached, every API call made against the sandbox and its result, and the person and agent behind them. Parity signs it; parity proof verify proof.zip checks the signature against the published keys (GET /v0/keys) and exits non-zero if any file changed.

Terminal
parity proof add screenshots/ test-output.txt --note "Invite link expires after 7 days"
parity proof export --result pass --summary "Invites expire; expired links show the resend page" -o proof.zip