Dory: services and features

Public edition, November 2026. Dory is in development and the invite-only beta has not opened yet. Everything below describes the planned service; prices and limits are planned and may change.

Overview

Dory (Agent Computers by ComputeEngines) gives your AI agent its own persistent Linux computer, billed by the second and capped each month. Each computer is a full virtual machine with root access, a desktop, SSH, Docker and Chromium. You can create it from an API, a command-line tool, an agent protocol or a web console.

It is built for two groups:

• Developers who run AI agents and need a real machine for them to work on: run commands, edit files, use a browser, show a result.
• Developers who want a long-lived cloud workstation they can pause and come back to.

The core promise is a workspace that stays. Pause keeps memory, so every window and process is still there on resume. Stop does not keep memory. You bring your own agent and model keys; the service has no built-in agent and holds no model keys.

The service is planned as a paid, invite-only beta. Payment comes before use: there is no free tier and no trial at launch. Computers run on hardware we operate in New Jersey, in a single location, with no availability promise. The last section says plainly what exists today.

The computers

Every computer is its own virtual machine. It runs the ce-desktop image: Debian 13 with an XFCE desktop and Chromium. Set desktop:false for a headless computer. Linux is the only guest operating system. Windows, macOS and GPUs are not offered.

Disk size is fixed at creation. A resize changes CPU and RAM only, and only while the computer is stopped.

Lifecycle. You can create, start, stop, restart, pause, resume, resize and delete a computer. Pause keeps memory. Stop keeps the disk and discards memory. Delete needs a confirmation header. Long operations return an operation ID, and ?wait= holds the request until the work is done.

Modes. On-demand computers are billed while running and pause or stop after a run timer (3,600 seconds by default). Always-on computers hold their capacity and restart after a planned restart.

Copies. Snapshots (with memory) restore the same computer: 3 per computer on Tier 1 and 5 on Tier 2. Private images create new computers: 2 per day on Tier 1 and 10 per day on Tier 2. Both are stored alongside the computers, so they are not backups.

Ways to drive a computer

Five interfaces control the same computers, so a person and an agent can share one machine. Every interface calls the HTTPS API. The control API creates and manages computers, and the data API reaches the desktop, terminal and files through the in-guest agent.

• REST API. Documented in an OpenAPI 3.1 file, with an AsyncAPI file for streaming. Every response carries a request ID.
• Python and TypeScript SDKs. Python has sync and async clients. The TypeScript client has no dependencies. Both handle access tokens, streaming and safe retries.
• cec CLI. Every customer-facing API operation has a command, with --json output.
• MCP server. Hosted, with about 36 tools limited by the key's scopes. cec mcp runs it locally. Web connectors that need OAuth come after launch.
• Web console. The same computers in a browser.

Interactive access

A person can work on any computer from the web console, with no local tools. The console lists computers, creates them, pauses and resumes them, and opens the desktop, terminal and file pages for each one.

Human takeover. A person can take exclusive control of the desktop. While they hold it, the agent's own actions return human_in_control. The agent can see who has control, and end the session. This lets an agent ask for help, such as a login or a CAPTCHA, and then carry on.

A headless computer has no desktop, so its desktop calls return desktop_disabled. Desktop recording and the accessibility tree are planned for after launch.

Accounts and security

Every account is protected by a second factor, and every credential is scoped, short-lived or revocable. There is no password or account recovery at launch, so customers must enroll a second authenticator.

Sign-up. You give an email, a password, your country, whether you are a business or a developer, and during the beta an invite code. Your account starts at Tier 0: it can pay for credit but cannot create computers. The first credited top-up and a verified email unlock Tier 1.

Sign-in. The console needs your password plus either an authenticator app (TOTP) or a passkey with user verification. One TOTP factor and up to ten passkeys can be enrolled. A session ends after 30 idle minutes or 12 hours in total. Key changes and other sensitive actions need a fresh check within five minutes.

API keys. Keys are shown once. Presets are Full, Agent, CI and Read-only. A key can be limited to chosen computers, a metadata selector, an IP allowlist, an expiry (at most 365 days) and a maximum running cost per hour. A key can create only keys with equal or fewer rights. Revocation takes effect within five seconds.

Access tokens. For one computer and chosen scopes, valid for up to 60 minutes. Hand one to an agent instead of an API key.

Browser origin rules. Preview links are redeemed by a same-origin POST, and the resulting cookie works for that preview host only. Never send an API key to a preview or to a program running inside a computer.

Sign-up is unavailable from sanctioned countries. Country availability will be confirmed before the beta opens.

Billing and plans

You prepay credit, computers bill by the second, and each computer's monthly charge stops at a cap. All prices below are planned and subject to change before launch.

The cap covers compute plus the computer's own disk and saved memory. Always-on computers pay the cap spread over 730 hours, and never more than the cap in a UTC month. Snapshot and image storage over 10 GB per account costs $0.05 per GB-month. Outbound traffic over 100 GB per account per month costs $0.02 per GB.

Top-ups. Pay with Bitcoin on-chain through our Bitcoin checkout. Minimum $20. Maximum $250 per top-up in the first 30 days, then $1,000. PayPal and card are not offered at launch. An agent can create a payment link, but a person pays it.

Spend limits. Set a monthly limit that pauses computers or only notifies you. Set a maximum running cost per hour on each API key. Raising a limit needs a fresh second-factor check.

Account tiers. Tiers unlock sizes and limits as an account builds paid history.

Trust, safety and abuse prevention

We contain suspected abuse first and review it second. Abuse controls never delete customer data automatically.

At sign-up. Sign-up needs an invite code during the beta and a declared country. Accounts start at Tier 0 with no compute, and tiers unlock only as paid history and account age build up.

Detection. Automated checks look for abuse of the platform. They never read the commands you run or their output. A match starts a review, not a final finding.

What happens next. We may restrict or suspend computers or accounts.

Abuse reports. Report abuse to abuse@computeengines.com. Copyright notices follow a separate procedure.

Preservation holds. A legal hold keeps evidence. Destructive requests for held data return 409 invalid_state, while stop and pause stay available. Suspected child-abuse material is never browsed.

Terms and policies will be published before the beta opens.

Networking

Each computer has outbound internet access that you control, and inbound access only through defined paths. You set an egress mode per computer and can change it while the computer runs: open, allowlist (up to 64 domains or CIDR ranges) or none. Restricting an agent's destinations is the recommended default before it reads untrusted web content.

Always blocked. Outbound mail ports (25, 465, 587, 2525), mining pools, private and internal ranges, and IPv6. There are no mail exceptions at launch, at any tier.

IP addresses. Outbound traffic leaves from a shared IPv4 address. The address is shared with accounts in the same tier, and it changes when your tier changes. A dedicated public IPv4 is planned for after launch.

Inbound. There are no public raw TCP or UDP ports on a computer. Reach it through private HTTPS previews, hooks for incoming webhooks, or SSH through our gateway (with a port-443 fallback).

Bandwidth. Limits rise with tier:

100 GB of outbound traffic per account per month is included.

Notifications and mail

The service sends a small set of account and billing emails, and nothing else. It sends no marketing mail and no mail to accounts that have not paid. Computers themselves cannot send outbound mail, because the mail ports are blocked.

Every email is also shown in the console, and low-balance and billing changes appear as events in the API event feed (30 days of history). Addresses that bounce or complain are suppressed. Deletion of an unpaid account's computers never goes ahead unless every retention notice was accepted by your mail server; a missing or bounced notice holds deletion. Tax treatment on receipts has not been finalized.

Reliability and operations

The service runs in a single location with no availability promise, so we focus on early warning, fast containment and honest limits. There is no service-level agreement and no audit certification. During the beta, deletion needs a manual confirmation.

Maintenance. Planned maintenance happens on Saturdays, US Eastern. Afterwards always-on computers restart, paused computers keep their memory, and on-demand computers that were running come back stopped.

Your data. Customer content such as command output, files and screenshots is never logged. A deleted computer is purged after 24 hours. Snapshots and images are not backups, so keep your own copies of anything that matters.

Developer documentation and quickstarts

A new developer can go from sign-up to a running computer by following one quickstart, in the language they already use: curl, Python, TypeScript or the cec command line. The documentation also has concept pages, how-to guides (Chrome, Docker, hooks, Playwright, private images, snapshots, SSH with VS Code, web apps, low balance, Bitcoin payments and closing an account), agent pages for the MCP server and the Claude and OpenAI computer-use adapters, porting guides for developers moving from E2B, Boat, Orgo or Daytona, streaming protocol pages, and the OpenAPI and AsyncAPI files. See Documentation and the API reference.

Status

Dory is in development. The invite-only, paid beta has not opened and you cannot create an account yet. We do not promise dates. You can request beta access or email support@computeengines.com. See also the status page.