Everyone's holding their laptops open

2026-05-07 · Source: Matthew Berman · Field: Technology & Digital — Cloud Computing & IT Infrastructure, Software Development & Engineering, Artificial Intelligence & Machine Learning · Depth: Fundamental Awareness, quick

Summary

Many users keep their laptops open while moving to prevent agents or processes from stopping, leading to inconvenience and potential damage. This common practice, observed on both Windows and Mac machines, is often unnecessary. A more efficient and practical solution involves utilizing cloud agents. By deploying agents in cloud environments, users can spin up multiple isolated environments, one per agent, and clone them as needed. This approach allows processes to run uninterrupted even when the local machine is closed, enabling users to resume work later without disruption.

Key takeaway

For professionals running background agents or long-duration tasks, adopting cloud agents is crucial. This shift allows your processes to run continuously in the cloud, freeing you from the need to keep your laptop open and preventing disruptions. You can initiate tasks, close your device, and return later to find them completed, significantly improving workflow flexibility and device portability.

Key insights

Cloud agents enable continuous process execution, eliminating the need to keep laptops open.

Principles

• Isolate agents in dedicated environments.
• Cloud environments ensure process continuity.

Method

Deploy agents in cloud environments, spinning up and cloning environments as needed to support each agent's execution.

In practice

• Run multiple agents concurrently.
• Close your laptop without disrupting tasks.

Topics

• Open Laptops
• Agent Persistence
• Cloud Agents
• Environment Cloning
• Power Management Settings

Best for: Machine Learning Engineer, AI Engineer, MLOps Engineer, DevOps Engineer

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Editorial summary, takeaway, and curation by AIssential. Original article published by Matthew Berman.