Sworn

Sworn is a small deterministic delivery engine. It carries software work from a proposed plan through to a checked merge, and it is the sole active authority for that journey: no separate installation, release, version match, or certification of another product is required to build or run it.

Sworn's design absorbed the trust rules and recorded handoffs of a retired predecessor protocol, now embedded and re-worded in Sworn's own role vocabulary (ADR-0014). Records written under the old vocabulary are not migrated. It is design heritage, not a product Sworn depends on at build or run time.

Sworn gives each part of the job a clear owner:

• the Planner proposes the work and its order;
• the Implementer designs and writes the change;
• the Lead reviews the design before implementation continues;
• a fresh Verifier checks the finished candidate; and
• Sworn performs the Git merge only after its own recorded handoffs show a passing result.

Planner
   |
   v
Implementer --> Lead
   ^              |
   +---- revise --+
   |
   +---- proceed --> Implementer --> fresh Verifier --> checked Merge

AI models do the role work. Sworn controls what is allowed to run, what happens next, how failed work is retried, and when Git may change. It saves commands and external work before execution, so a stopped process can recover from recorded facts instead of guessing. A successful model response is never treated as an approval or a passing verdict.

Sworn's orchestrator

Sworn's orchestrator keeps the relay moving when a worker asks a question, reports a block, or returns something Sworn cannot safely use. It can resume the same worker with an answer grounded in saved facts, ask the Lead for advice, retry an operational failure, or pause only that track for a human answer while independent work continues.

The orchestrator is not a sixth role. It cannot approve a plan, invent a Lead decision or Verifier verdict, or merge code. Only Sworn's own recorded handoffs decide what advances.

Current release candidate

Sworn 1.0.0-rc.2-dev embeds its own Planner, Implementer, Lead, and Verifier role assets; some of that prose and reference material still carries the retired predecessor's 1.0.0-rc.14 reference content, re-worded. Check the installed version and embedded role-asset identity with sworn version, or use sworn version --json when another tool needs to read them.

This candidate can:

• run the Planner, Implementer, Lead, Verifier, and merge journey;
• work on independent tracks in parallel while keeping changes on each track in order;
• pause, resume, cancel, take over, and retry a saved run safely;
• find the project's local delivery releases and saved Sworn runs in one terminal view;
• show the same saved facts in the terminal, JSON, and a local browser board;
• use Codex CLI, Claude Code CLI, OpenAI Responses, OpenAI-compatible Chat Completions, DeepSeek, Gemini, and two Amazon Bedrock connection types; and
• check connection configuration locally or perform an explicit live certification.

This is a public release candidate for evaluation. Its command and file contracts may still change before 1.0.0.

Install

Sworn currently ships for Linux x86_64:

brew install --cask swornagent/tap/sworn

The GitHub release also provides a verified archive for direct installation. See the installation guide for checksums, upgrades, and runtime requirements.

Start here

The run guide covers the files an operator supplies, AI connection checks, starting a run, viewing progress, recovery states, and the local browser board. The launch guide walks through launching a release with plan pin, plan lint, plan record, the canonical manifest, operator config and serve, with each launch refusal code and what to do about it.

From anywhere inside a Git project, run:

sworn

In an interactive terminal, this opens the project view. It finds local delivery releases and saved Sworn runs, lets you move between their boards, and offers only the controls allowed by the current board. sworn tui opens the same view explicitly. When input or output is piped or redirected, bare sworn prints help instead. The full command line remains available for scripts and exact run control.

Command	What it does
sworn or sworn tui	Open the interactive project view.
sworn run	Start or continue the run described by a manifest.
sworn board	Show what Sworn is doing, what is next, and whether a person is needed.
sworn serve	Open the same run board in a local browser service. See the launch guide for launch refusals.
sworn pause, resume, cancel, takeover	Safely control a saved run.
sworn retry	Retry one stopped work item with its current safety values.
sworn answer	Answer a question that has paused one part of the work.
sworn status --json	Return the stable run record for another program.
sworn driver inspect, doctor, certify	Check configured AI connections at increasing depth.
sworn driver probe	Send one minimal live request to prove one named lane is admitting requests right now.

Exact command syntax:

sworn tui [--project ABS] [--journal ABS] [--config ABS] [--manifest-dir ABS]
sworn version [--json]
sworn run --manifest ABS --journal ABS [--config ABS]
sworn pause|cancel --run ID --journal ABS --command ID --generation N
sworn resume|takeover --run ID --journal ABS --command ID --generation N [--config ABS]
sworn retry --run ID --journal ABS --command ID --generation N --work SHA256 --epoch N [--config ABS]
sworn answer --run ID --journal ABS --attention SHA256 --generation 1 --answer TEXT [--config ABS]
sworn status --run ID --journal ABS --json
sworn board --run ID --journal ABS [--json]
sworn serve --run ID --journal ABS [--manifest ABS] [--config ABS] [--operator-config ABS]
sworn driver inspect|doctor|certify --config ABS (--profile PROFILE --model MODEL | --all) --json
sworn driver probe --config ABS --profile PROFILE --model MODEL [--json]

AI connections

A production run names the exact AI profile and model for every role. It also binds a secret-free sworn.driver-config/v1 file. The matching file must be supplied when the run starts and whenever a restart command needs to drive more work.

The configuration names connection types, endpoints, model names, and references to credentials. Secret values stay in environment variables, owner-only files, or the AWS credential chain. Sworn does not copy them into the manifest, journal, diagnostics, evidence, or telemetry.

Sworn never chooses a provider or model, changes API dialect, or falls back to a different connection. OpenAI Responses and OpenAI-compatible Chat Completions are separate, explicit choices.

Build and verify

Go 1.26.5 or newer is required. Production model execution currently requires Linux and a root-owned bwrap discoverable on PATH (for example /usr/bin/bwrap) with unprivileged user namespaces enabled.

The local code checks are:

GOFLAGS=-buildvcs=false go test -count=1 \
  ./cmd/sworn ./internal/... ./tools/...
GOFLAGS=-buildvcs=false go test -count=1 \
  -parallel=1 -timeout=20m ./test/e2e
GOFLAGS=-buildvcs=false go test -count=1 -race \
  ./cmd/sworn ./internal/... ./tools/...
GOFLAGS=-buildvcs=false go vet ./...
test -z "$(git ls-files -z -- '*.go' \
  ':(exclude,top).sworn/records/**' | xargs -0 -r gofmt -l)"
go mod tidy -diff
git diff --check

The release process also builds the candidate twice and runs the separately authorized live connection certification. See the current release-candidate overview for the exact evidence and known limits.

Technical source map

cmd/sworn         command line, project TUI, and local browser service
internal/protocol the embedded delivery protocol and deterministic decisions
internal/runtime  work order, recovery, and the single state owner
internal/journal  saved commands, external work, receipts, and events
internal/gitx     measured Git facts and controlled Git changes
internal/driver   AI connection selection, tools, and credentials
internal/cockpit  terminal, JSON, and browser views of the same run
internal/tui      interactive navigation across project releases and runs
internal/observe  local evaluation and optional telemetry

.sworn/records is the default records root: it contains delivery control records, not product source. Every host location Sworn reads or writes is configurable — project-scoped locations (records, journals, contracts root, documents root and the commit-message prefix) come from the committed docs/sworn/sworn.json, and machine/user locations (workspace factory root, temp roots, credentials directory, artefact home) resolve from SWORN_* environment variables with XDG-conformant defaults. See docs/sworn/config.md for the schema, the defaults, and the refusal rules. Earlier releases and retired protocol lines remain unchanged as historical evidence.