Overview

HarnessOS — Overview

HarnessOS is an Arch Linux-based distribution built specifically for AI-powered software development. It ships with a complete, pre-configured development environment so you can start coding with AI assistance immediately after booting.

What ships out of the box

Tool	Purpose
Claude CLI (claude)	AI pair programmer — conversational coding assistant
Ollama	Local LLM runner — run models like Llama 3.2 offline
GitHub Copilot CLI	AI code completion via gh copilot
Hyprland	Tiling Wayland compositor — fast, GPU-accelerated
Firefox	Web browser with DevTools
VS Code (code)	Editor with full language support
Docker + Docker Compose	Container runtime, pre-configured
Python + pip + uv	Python stack with modern tooling
Node.js + npm + pnpm	JavaScript/TypeScript runtime
.NET SDK	C# development
OpenJDK + Maven	Java development
PHP + Composer	PHP development
Neovim + lazygit	Terminal editor and git TUI
Kitty	GPU-accelerated terminal emulator
Starship	Cross-shell prompt
zsh + autosuggestions	Shell with completions

Kernel

HarnessOS uses linux-zen — a patched kernel optimized for desktop responsiveness and lower latency, ideal for interactive development workflows.

Filesystem

Installed systems use BTRFS with subvolumes:

Subvolume	Mount	Purpose
@	/	Root
@home	/home	User data
@var	/var	Variable data
@var_log	/var/log	Logs
@snapshots	/.snapshots	Snapper snapshots
@swap	/swap	Swap (NoCoW)

Snapper is configured for automatic timeline snapshots. Every pacman operation creates a pre/post snapshot via snap-pac.

Target audience

• Developers who want a pre-configured Linux environment for AI-assisted coding
• Teams standardizing on a development OS
• Users who want Arch's rolling updates with a curated defaults layer