WendyOS

WendyOS is an Embedded Linux operating system for edge computing. It supports:

• NVIDIA Jetson devices (production with OTA updates)
• Raspberry Pi 4/5 (edge devices)
• ARM64/AMD64 VMs (development)

Learning About Wendy

Before helping with Wendy commands, run this to learn all available commands:

wendy --experimental-dump-help

This outputs a JSON structure with all commands, flags, and documentation.

Whenever you invoke a wendy command, use the JSON structure options to provide structured JSON output. This will also prevent interactive dialogs and errors. Use --json or -j to provide JSON output.

Common Tasks

• Run an app: wendy run
• Create a new project: wendy init
• Discover devices: wendy discover
• Update agent: wendy device update
• Configure WiFi: wendy device wifi connect
• Install WendyOS on an external drive: wendy os install
• Set a device as default using wendy device set-default

wendy init — Create a New Wendy Lite Project

Creates a new Wendy Lite project with the required scaffolding:

wendy init

This sets up a new project directory with a wendy.json configuration file and the necessary structure for building and deploying a Wendy Lite app.

wendy run — Run a Wendy Lite Project

Builds, uploads, and runs a Wendy Lite project on a connected device:

wendy run

This command handles the full development cycle: compiling the app, transferring the binary to the device, and starting execution. Use --verbose for detailed build output.

wendy device wifi connect — Set Up WiFi

Configures WiFi credentials on a connected device:

wendy device wifi connect

This sends WiFi SSID and password to the device so it can connect to the local network. The device must be reachable over USB or an existing connection first.

Setup and Configuration

Wendy CLI connects to a device over gRPC (TCP) port 50051. If Wendy CLI is not installed yet, you can use brew install wendy to install it.

Devices are discovered over USB or LAN. If a device is not found, ask the user to check the connection or to connect it over USB. If a device is not yet installed, use wendy os install to install the OS to an external drive. For NVIDIA Jetson devices, the OS is commonly installed to NVMe.

Development

WendyOS is a Linux-based containerized operating system. It uses Linux containers to run your apps.

WendyOS uses Swift.org as its flagship language. This uses Swift Package Manager and the Swift Container Plugin to build and run your app. Wendy CLI will cross compile Swift for you.

Other programming languages are supported, but require the use of a Dockerfile to build your app.

Entitlements

WendyOS uses an entitlement system, managed through wendy.json, to manage permissions for your app. This reflects how your container will be set up on the device.

See references/wendy.json.md for detailed entitlement configuration.

Quick Start

1. Create a new Swift project or navigate to an existing one
2. Initialize wendy.json: wendy project init
3. Add required entitlements (e.g., for a web server): wendy project entitlements add network --mode host
4. Run on device: wendy run

Common Entitlements

Remote Debugging

WendyOS provides built-in support for remote debugging Swift apps. Use wendy run --debug to include and launch a debugging session. This exposes a GDB server on port 4242.

Connecting from VS Code

1. Run wendy run --debug
2. In VS Code, use the CodeLLDB extension
3. Connect to <device-ip>:4242

Observability

WendyOS runs a local OpenTelemetry collector on each device. Apps should report telemetry (logs, metrics, traces) to this local collector.

Configuration

Use HTTP protocol (not gRPC) for OTel exports:

import OTel

var config = OTel.Configuration.default
config.traces.otlpExporter.protocol = .httpProtobuf
config.traces.otlpExporter.endpoint = "http://localhost:4318"
config.metrics.otlpExporter.protocol = .httpProtobuf
config.metrics.otlpExporter.endpoint = "http://localhost:4318"
config.logs.otlpExporter.protocol = .httpProtobuf
config.logs.otlpExporter.endpoint = "http://localhost:4318"

let observability = try OTel.bootstrap(configuration: config)

Or via environment variables:

OTEL_EXPORTER_OTLP_PROTOCOL=http/protobuf
OTEL_EXPORTER_OTLP_ENDPOINT=http://localhost:4318

The local collector handles forwarding telemetry to your backend infrastructure.

Troubleshooting

Reference Files

Load these files as needed for specific topics:

• references/wendy.json.md - App configuration, entitlements (network, gpu, video, audio, bluetooth), common configurations, CLI commands

Further Reading

WendyOS documentation at https://wendy.sh/docs/