boring computers

On-demand Linux computers you can hand to an AI.

Each one is a real Firecracker microVM — a full machine with its own kernel — that boots in milliseconds, does its thing, and self-destructs when it's done (or stays up as long as you want). Open source (Apache-2.0), self-hosted with your own keys. boringcomputers.com is a showcase; you run the real thing yourself.

What a boring computer looks like

One machine, everything on it — a live desktop with a real browser, a terminal with coding agents preinstalled, and an AI you can hand the whole thing to. Type "build a snake game" and it writes it, runs it, and gives you a link to play.

What you get

• A computer — a full Linux desktop (browser, terminal, apps) over VNC, or a fast headless shell.
• Coding agents preinstalled — claude, codex, cursor, pi, plus node, python, git and internet.
• An AI that drives it — say what you want. It either uses the screen (clicks, browses) or writes + runs code and hands you a live URL.
• Files & ports — drag files in and out; open any port through the daemon.
• Fork — clone a running computer, exact live state and all, in ~35 ms.
• Storage — persistent volumes (S3-backed) that outlive a machine.
• Ephemeral or not — machines self-destruct on a TTL by default; flip keep alive and one runs until you stop it.

Run your own

You need a machine that can run Firecracker — a Linux box with /dev/kvm, or just your Mac:

On a Linux box — Ubuntu 24.04, x86_64 or arm64, with /dev/kvm (bare-metal, or a VM with nested virtualization) that you can root-SSH into. One command turns it into a running boringd:

git clone https://github.com/michaelshimeles/boring-computers
cd boring-computers && npm install

# set it up on your box (installs Firecracker, builds the images, runs boringd)
BORING_ANTHROPIC_KEY=sk-ant-...  ./infra/setup.sh root@YOUR_BOX_IP

Don't have a box? If you use Latitude.sh, infra/latitude/provision.sh creates one for you first. Any other provider works too — just point setup.sh at it.

On an Apple Silicon Mac (M3 or later) — no server needed. One command builds the whole arm64 stack in a nested-virt Lima VM; real microVMs boot on your laptop (a shell restores from snapshot in ~5 ms):

brew install lima
BORING_ANTHROPIC_KEY=sk-ant-...  ./infra/local/setup-local.sh
# boringd is now at http://localhost:8088 — details in infra/local/README.md

(Windows 11 via WSL2 is designed but not yet wired up — see infra/local/README.md.)

Then run the site against it:

# apps/web/.env
PUBLIC_BORING_URL=http://YOUR_BOX_IP:8080   # or a tunnel — see apps/web/.env.example
npm run dev -w web

setup.sh options (env): BORING_TOKEN (require auth), BORING_S3_* (persistent volumes), BIND_LOCALHOST=1 (reach it only via SSH tunnel — most private), SKIP_DESKTOP=1 (skip the ~8-min desktop image). Full REST + WebSocket API in the docs.

From any AI — an MCP server (boring-computers-mcp) lets Claude Desktop, Cursor, and other agents spin up and drive your computers as a tool:

{
	"mcpServers": {
		"boring-computers": {
			"command": "npx",
			"args": ["-y", "boring-computers-mcp"],
			"env": { "BORING_URL": "http://localhost:8080" }
		}
	}
}

There's also an Effect-native TypeScript client, boring-computers-sdk (npm install boring-computers-sdk).

How it works

Real hardware-virtualized isolation — a kernel per machine, not a shared container. Each VM is jailed and resource-capped, restored from a memory snapshot in ~3 ms, and self-destructs on a TTL (or runs until you stop it, when the server enables BORING_ALLOW_PERSISTENT). Guests are network-isolated behind an egress firewall. The control plane is boringd/ (Go); host setup is one command (infra/setup.sh).

Repo

A Turborepo monorepo (npm workspaces):

apps/web/          the site — SvelteKit
boringd/           the control plane — Go, runs the microVMs
packages/sdk/      boring-computers-sdk — Effect-native TypeScript client
packages/mcp/      boring-computers-mcp — MCP server
infra/setup.sh     one-command host setup (any Ubuntu + KVM box)
infra/latitude/    rootfs/kernel/image builds, networking, Caddy, Latitude helpers

npm install      # all workspaces
npm run dev      # the site
npm run build    # production build
npm run check    # type-check
npm run lint     # prettier + eslint

Contributing & license

Contributions welcome — see CONTRIBUTING.md. Licensed under Apache 2.0.