Editions and package composition

HorneroOS is organized as one operating-system family. Its editions share a base and compose roles and capabilities; they are not separate distributions with copied package scripts.

The canonical product model lives in HorneroOS/hornero’s edition catalogue. The resolver at scripts/resolve-edition.py turns an edition and optional compositor into a deterministic Arch package list. It does not build an image or certify the resulting system.

Composition model

Base + desktop + compositor:hyprland  → Desktop / Hyprland
Base + desktop + compositor:niri      → Desktop / Niri
Base + server                          → Server
Base + server + agent-host             → Agents
Base + desktop + studio                → Studio

The same model is independent of the graphical installer. The installer is not yet a supported consumer, and HorneroOS does not currently publish installable ISO images.

Current maturity

Desktop — Preview. Real desktop product and package composition; no supported installer or ISO.
Hyprland — Supported. Validated default desktop session.
Niri — Experimental. A single-output VM journey is verified. See Wayland compositors for the gaps.
Server — Planned. A headless package set is described; a bootable image and full remote-administration acceptance are not available.
Agents — Planned. Rootless Podman and systemd Quadlet are the direction; Hermes provisioning, isolation, secrets, lifecycle, and recovery are not certified.
Studio — Planned. A creative package set is described; audio, capture, editing, hardware acceleration, and compositor workflows are not certified.
Labwc — Planned. No Hornero backend or package set is offered.

These labels describe product evidence, not whether an upstream package exists or whether an individual component works on its own.

Edition intent

Desktop is a Wayland-first desktop powered by Hornero Shell. Hyprland is the default validated backend; Niri is experimental.
Server is intended to be a small, remotely operable headless system. Its current package proposal excludes graphical Shell and compositor packages.
Agents is intended to extend Server with isolated agent workloads. The model forbids exposing a privileged host Docker socket or baking credentials into images. Those are design constraints, not a claim that the workload runtime is ready.
Studio is intended to extend Desktop with creative-production tools. REAPER and Windows VST integrations remain optional, licensed, and user-supplied; no personal license or plugin is part of HorneroOS.

Check package composition

From a checkout of HorneroOS/hornero, inspect the exact package result without installing anything:

python3 scripts/resolve-edition.py desktop --json
python3 scripts/resolve-edition.py desktop --compositor niri --json
python3 scripts/resolve-edition.py server --json
python3 scripts/resolve-edition.py agents --json
python3 scripts/resolve-edition.py studio --compositor hyprland --json

Package resolution is an architecture check. A product becomes installable only after its services, runtime behavior, recovery, image or install path, and acceptance evidence are implemented and tested.