Bed of Roses
Bed of Roses (BOR) is an AI-native macOS companion. Instead of living in a browser tab or an editor sidebar, a small draggable presence floats above your real desktop. You talk to it, and each turn of the conversation can do real work on your machine: generate a full app, drop a live widget into the conversation, write and run code, change your wallpaper and theme, control other Mac apps, browse the web, schedule tasks, or just answer a question. BOR is not a chatbot with a few plugins bolted on. It is a small operating-system layer built around one idea: a conversation should be able to produce durable software and take real action, not just text.What makes it different
| Most AI assistants | Bed of Roses |
|---|---|
| Live in a tab / sidebar | A presence that floats over your actual desktop |
| Return text | Return apps, widgets, files, theme changes, real actions |
| One model, one vendor | Provider parity — Anthropic, OpenAI, Gemini, OpenAI-compatible, or BOR credits |
| Chat history | Persistent memory, generated apps you keep, multiple isolated “presences” |
| Fixed UI | Themeable down to fonts, wallpaper, and the look of every generated surface |
A 30-second mental model
- You type a message to the presence.
- The Node runtime (“the brain”) builds a system prompt, streams it to your chosen LLM, and parses the model’s reply.
- The model replies in a small XML tool protocol —
<say>,<create_app>,<write_file>,<execute_command>,<set_theme>,<browser_action>, and dozens more. - The runtime executes each tool: it writes the app to disk, runs the command, changes the theme, opens the browser.
- Results stream back into the thought bubble as live cards (a code editor, a terminal, a browser session, a generated image), and durable results (apps, files, themes) persist.
The two surfaces
BOR ships as two cooperating front-ends over the same Node runtime:- v2 Mac host (
v2/host/) — the product. An Electron app that owns a frameless, always-on-top presence window, opens generated apps as native Mac windows, and applies macOS wallpapers. This is what you use day to day. - Classic browser shell (
shell/+server/) — the original browser-hosted “empty OS” served athttp://localhost:7777. Still used for onboarding and as a development surface.
What it can do (at a glance)
- Build software — generate complete apps and widgets, or write and run real projects (React/Vite/Next/Python/Rust/…) in a workspace. See Apps, Shortcuts, Running commands.
- Use your computer — read the screen, click and type in other apps, open applications. See Computer use.
- Browse the web — drive a real headless browser, search, fetch and read pages. See The browser and Web & media.
- Edit files — read, write, and surgically patch files anywhere you allow. See File editing.
- Remember — durable long-term memory and a learned profile. See Memory.
- Extend itself — MCP servers (install from a marketplace), skills, custom themes. See MCP, Skills, Themes.
- Run on a schedule — cron jobs and a notification inbox. See Cron & notifications.
- Be many — run several isolated presences, each with its own data, memory, and personality. See Multi-presence.
Where to go next
- New here? Start with What is Bed of Roses, then Installation and the Quickstart.
- Want the internals? Read Architecture and The protocol.
- Looking for one tool? Jump to the Tool reference.