BOAR v0.1.2 (beta)

Warning

Beta. BOAR for Windows is early software, made for builders who want to try it and help shape it. Expect rough edges, and keep anything important backed up. Found a bug? Open an issue. A security problem? See SECURITY.md.

BOAR for Windows: an offline research assistant that answers from Wikipedia and your own files, with sources, on your own computer.

Install

1. Download BOAR-Setup.exe below (122 MB). It installs for your user only, no administrator password.
2. The installer isn't code-signed yet, so Windows SmartScreen will warn you: click More info → Run anyway.
3. On first launch, pick a model. BOAR downloads it once (Qwen2.5-1.5B is about 1 GB); after that it works offline.

Needs Windows 10 or 11, 64-bit. A GPU with Vulkan (NVIDIA, AMD, Intel) makes it faster; without one it runs on the CPU.

Changes since v0.1.0

• Security: Electron 44 (v0.1.0 shipped Electron 40, which no longer gets Chromium security fixes); PDFs are read without loading their fonts; installers are built from the tag by GitHub Actions with a signed provenance attestation.
• Report a vulnerability privately: see SECURITY.md.

If you installed v0.1.0, install this one over it: your models and chats stay.

What's in it

• Answers with numbered sources from a local library: built-in Wikipedia articles, downloadable packs up to 50,000 articles, and your own .txt, .md, .csv, .json and .pdf files
• Watched folders that index new files by themselves, with a boar in the system tray
• Voice input (whisper.cpp, on your computer) and answers read aloud
• Profiles: a name, a tone, and which collections a conversation may read
• A PIN that locks the app and encrypts chats on disk
• Optional, off by default: share your library with Claude Desktop and other MCP clients, and a local OpenAI-compatible API on 127.0.0.1

Checksums

SHA256SUMS.txt has the SHA-256 of both installers (BOAR-Setup.exe and BOAR-Setup-0.1.2.exe are the same file). Each one also has a signed build attestation: gh attestation verify BOAR-Setup.exe --repo Bielcx/boar-desktop confirms it was built by this repository's release workflow from the v0.1.2 tag.

BOAR v0.1.0 (beta)

Warning

Beta. BOAR for Windows is early software, made for builders who want to try it and help shape it. Expect rough edges, and keep anything important backed up. Found a bug? Open an issue. A security problem? See SECURITY.md.

Superseded by v0.1.2, a security update (Electron 44). Please install that one.

The first release of BOAR for Windows: an offline research assistant that answers from Wikipedia and your own files, with sources, on your own computer.

Install

1. Download BOAR-Setup.exe below (106 MB). It installs for your user only, no administrator password.
2. The installer isn't code-signed yet, so Windows SmartScreen will warn you: click More info → Run anyway.
3. On first launch, pick a model. BOAR downloads it once (Qwen2.5-1.5B is about 1 GB); after that it works offline.

Needs Windows 10 or 11, 64-bit. A GPU with Vulkan (NVIDIA, AMD, Intel) makes it faster; without one it runs on the CPU.

What's in it

• Answers with numbered sources from a local library: built-in Wikipedia articles, downloadable packs up to 50,000 articles, and your own .txt, .md, .csv, .json and .pdf files
• Watched folders that index new files by themselves, with a boar in the system tray
• Voice input (whisper.cpp, on your computer) and answers read aloud
• Profiles: a name, a tone, and which collections a conversation may read
• A PIN that locks the app and encrypts chats on disk
• Optional, off by default: share your library with Claude Desktop and other MCP clients, and a local OpenAI-compatible API on 127.0.0.1

Checksums

SHA256SUMS.txt has the SHA-256 of both installers (BOAR-Setup.exe and BOAR-Setup-0.1.0.exe are the same file).