Pairing
Pairing is the one-time step that links your phone to a laptop running ResearchOS. You scan a QR code shown on the laptop, the two devices exchange public keys, and from then on your phone can send captures and pull glances from that laptop. Device keys protect the link. Account authorization and plan eligibility are separate from the QR exchange.
Before the Companion can do anything useful, it needs to know which laptop it is working with. A lab has many people and many machines, and a photo you snap has to land in your notebook, not someone else's. So the first thing the app asks you to do is pair, and pairing is built around a QR code the laptop shows and the phone scans.
Why a QR code, and why no password
Pairing has to do two jobs at once. It has to be quick enough that nobody avoids it, and it has to be trustworthy enough that a capture cannot be misrouted or read by anyone else. A QR code scanned in person does both. The laptop shows a code that carries a signed grant, the phone scans it face to face, and the in-person scan is itself the proof that this phone belongs with this laptop. No password to type, mistype, or share, and no shared notebook password to enter. Some app versions also require a fresh account sign-in to authorize enrollment. Follow the steps shown on screen.
When you scan, the phone verifies the grant is genuinely signed, then generates its own device keys and registers with the relay under those keys. From that point on, everything the laptop sends to your phone is sealed to your phone's key, so the relay in the middle only ever carries ciphertext. The keys, not a shared secret, are what make the link safe.
Pair your phone
On the laptop, open the Companion hub from the button in the app header. It shows a pairing QR code.
On the phone, open the Companion and choose to pair. Grant camera permission when asked, since the app needs the camera to read the code.
Point the phone at the QR code on the laptop screen. The phone verifies the signed grant, generates its device keys, and registers with the relay. Complete any account authorization step shown before continuing.
The app confirms the link and drops you on the home screen. You are paired, and you only do this once for that laptop.
Try the demo without a laptop
If you want to look around before you pair anything real, the pairing screen has a Try the demo option. It runs a fake pairing against sample data, so the app behaves as though it is connected to a laptop full of experiments without one being present. Every screen works, nothing you do there touches a real notebook, and you can leave the demo and pair for real whenever you are ready.
Laptop-side settings
Two companion preferences live in the laptop's Companion hub (the phone button in the app header, or Settings). Both are in the hub's Settings tab.
- Show Companion button on Home. Toggles the phone button in the app header. When off, the Companion is still reachable from Settings, but the button does not appear on every page.
- Auto-publish snapshots to paired phones. Controls whether the laptop actively pushes today, inventory, and notebook snapshots to paired phones. When off, the phone can still pull snapshots manually (pull-to-refresh), but the laptop stops the automatic push.