Most of my work projects require remote machines. But I edit local files most of the time (in Emacs). Unit tests may be run locally sometimes (docker or even on the localhost). Other tasks/tests run remotely and setup may be rather involved (VSC would be of little help here) but it is easy to use/extend (Python glues together some ssh commands and cloud APIs). The code may be synced (non CI case) using a customizable wrapper around entr & rsync (more efficient, more control, more reliable than VSC plugin)— it helps with the fast feedback loop.