Quick Start

Run a sovereign OS
in 5 minutes.

No hardware required. No account needed. Just QEMU and a curl. Boot the Micro demo in a VM, see NexShell render, and verify the development artifact sidecars produced by the local demo build.

Before You Start

Required

QEMU ≥ 7.0

Full system emulation for x86_64, ARM64, or RISC-V.

# Debian/Ubuntu sudo apt install qemu-system-x86 qemu-system-arm qemu-system-misc # macOS brew install qemu # Windows (WSL2) sudo apt install qemu-system-x86
Recommended

KVM Acceleration

Native virtualization for boot times under 2 seconds.

# Check if available ls /dev/kvm # Add your user to the kvm group sudo usermod -aG kvm $USER # Log out and back in

Choose Your Demo

The fastest path today. The CLI builds a development Micro image, boots it in QEMU, and shows the Nexus Micro banner plus a NexShell prompt.

curl -fsSL https://get.nexus-os.org | sh nexus run --profile=micro --demo

What happens: Tries a prebuilt Micro image → builds the local demo image when no prebuilt image exists → boots in QEMU → NexShell appears.

Preview target for the desktop VM image with compositor, registry, and NipCell support. The command surface exists, but this proof pack has not captured a NexBox boot yet.

curl -fsSL https://get.nexus-os.org | sh nexus run --profile=nexbox --vm

What happens: Planned full VM path with VirtIO-GPU, Net, Input, and NexShell on the Niri strip.

Preview what the Forge would build for your target without running the full local image pipeline.

curl -fsSL https://get.nexus-os.org | sh nexus build --edition=mech --arch=aarch64 --dry-run

What happens: Resolves the Mech recipe, shows dependency graph, prints estimated BKDL evidence and build time. No actual compile.


The 5-Minute Tour

01

Boot Sequence

Rumpk kernel loads. HAL initializes VirtIO devices. Nim L1 scheduler spawns the first fibers. Under 100ms from power-on to prompt.

02

NexShell

Type signal.fiber list and see a structured table: fiber names, spectrum tiers, memory usage. No character grid. Semantic rendering.

03

Verify

Run nexus verify on the Micro demo image. The current proof checks development signature, BKDL, and proof sidecars.

04

Crash & Restart

Planned NipCell proof. Driver crash and Blink Response restart demos need a separate captured run before public claims expand.


Keep Building

01

Build a Custom Image

Pick an edition, add drivers, set constraints, and forge your own signed system.

Open the Foundry →
02

Browse Packages

Explore the Sovereign Bazaar. Signed, reproducible, content-addressed packages ready to graft.

Visit the Bazaar →
03

Read the Docs

Deep-dive into the architecture, API references, and edition specifications.

Explore Docs →

We're Here to Help

If the demo doesn't work on your machine, we want to know. Every failure is a bug in the onboarding path.