Private beta · September 2026
ScrivenerOS

An operating system for a parent and a child.

Mentor and pupil. One shared machine. No terminal required.

ScrivenerOS is a kid-oriented Linux. When the student signs in, it promotes focus, the desire to learn, and a calm mind. For the parent who runs it, it stays delightfully easy: setup is a wizard, Secure Boot stays on, and all of it is free.

Read our promises ↓ Anarchy Games on GitHub →
Hours — today ● in sync
Today
Focus time · 3 apps open
Focus ends in
24:13
thenFree time · Steam unlocks
  • Readingdone
  • Mathfocus
  • Lunchbreak
  • Free timefree
  • Piano lessonimportant
Save your work.Focus time ends in five minutes. Your parent asked Hours to show this one.
from Ledger
Need a little longer?
the idea

It's a relationship, not a machine.

Most kid-safe computers are built around one user and a wall of locks. ScrivenerOS is built around two people. The student gets a desk that helps them concentrate; the parent gets a book of rules that is a pleasure to keep. One laptop, one cohesive experience — and every page of it looks like it came from the same book.

When the student signs in

A quiet desk, built for learning.

A calm, cohesive desktop: the dock on the left, a theme picked during setup, an illuminated initial where a distro's logo would normally sit. Hours keeps today's plan in the corner so nothing sneaks up on them, and Learn your Linux waits in the dock with lessons that begin with a picture of the thing rather than a wall of text.

Nothing is locked for the sake of it. The student can install Steam, a paint program, a code editor. A rule exists only where a parent wrote one.

When the parent signs in

Everything happens in a wizard or on your phone.

First boot walks you through it: your own admin account, the student's account, a theme, the apps you'd like installed (each one explains what it's good for), and whether you're adding more students. No terminal. No firmware menu. Nobody ever asks you to disable Secure Boot.

After that, the rules live in Ledger on your phone. Change an app's hours, approve a request, send a note — the laptop catches up on its own.

what's in the box

Everything a family laptop should already do.

Here is the feature list, in plain language. Some of it is in the current test build; the rest arrives with the companion apps below. The roadmap further down says which is which.

Secure Boot stays on.

It boots with Secure Boot enabled on an unmodified laptop. Nobody is ever told to turn it off, enroll a key, or click through a screen full of warnings.

Walk-through setup, no terminal.

The first-boot wizard creates the parent's admin account and the student's account, lets you choose a theme and the apps you want — each with a plain-English note on what it's good for — and asks whether you're adding more students.

Open by default.

The OS restricts nothing on its own. Kids can install Steam, creative tools, whatever they're into. The managed experience is a layer the parent switches on — Quill ships installed but off.

Apps open when the parent says.

Once Quill and Ledger are paired, every app gets its hours: focus time, free time, or never. Outside those hours an app simply won't open, and anything newly installed waits for a parent's approval.

Updates you can always undo.

ScrivenerOS is an image-based OS. Updates arrive whole and tested, stage quietly in the background, and apply on the next reboot. The previous version stays on the disk, so a bad update is one reboot from undone.

Themes from the first boot.

Pick a look during setup and the desktop follows it: the dock on the left, scriptorium branding throughout, no stray upstream logos. A matching icon set is on the roadmap.

Learn your Linux.

Built-in lessons on the desktop itself. Every topic opens with a picture of the thing it's teaching, then something to try with your own hands. Fifteen topics at launch.

Hours keeps the day in view.

A tuck-away widget with a countdown, today's schedule and gentle warnings before transitions — so the end of free time is never a surprise, for anyone.

Dual boot is off the table.

ScrivenerOS takes the whole disk — there is no second system for a determined ten-year-old to boot into. Re-imaging is never blocked, though. It's your laptop, and it always will be.

the companions

Three small apps, one shared page.

The OS on its own is a free, safe, kid-oriented Linux. Add the companions and it becomes a seriously managed device — managed in the open, where the student can read the same rules the parent wrote.

Quill

the agent on the laptop

Quill lives on the student's machine. It pulls the parent's ledger, compares it with what's actually on the laptop, and closes the gap: which apps may open right now, whether it's focus time or free time, which reminders to show. It ships pre-installed and switched off; the parent turns it on during setup or any day later.

  • Inventories every app on the machine
  • Keeps each app to its hours — focus, free or never
  • Holds new installs until a parent approves them
  • Reports refusals and time in each app to Ledger

Ledger

the parent's book of rules

A phone-first web app you install straight from the browser — no app store required. See what's installed on the kid's laptop, set focus time and free time, decide when each app can launch, approve a request with one tap, and send a note that appears on their screen.

  • Temporary overrides that expire on their own
  • Pause now, with a forced save-your-game warning
  • Websites in the same focus / free / never list
  • Two parents, one ledger; copy a setup to the next kid
  • A change history the kid can read too
  • A weekly note on what the kid accomplished, not just the rules

Hours

the student's day, at a glance

A widget that tucks away: a countdown, today's schedule, and a heads-up before anything changes. The student chooses which pop-ups they want; the parent can insist on a few — save your work, save your game, the piano lesson is in ten minutes.

  • Today view the moment they sign in
  • Countdown to the next transition
  • Ask for more time — answered from Ledger
  • Notes from the parent, shown the moment they arrive
desired stateLedger

The parent writes how the laptop should be.

reconcilerQuill

Compares that with how the laptop actually is, and fixes the difference.

what the student seesHours

Shows the plan, the countdown and any note the parent sent.

"In compliance" just means there's no difference left. Ledger and Quill talk to each other directly over your home network. When you're away, a relay passes the connection through, encrypted end to end — it can't read what's being said.

our promises

Two promises, in writing.

Written down in public, so you can hold us to them.

I
ScrivenerOS will never ask for ID verification to use it or its apps.
II
All updates and apps made for ScrivenerOS will always be free.

Open source, all of it.

The OS and its companion apps will be released as open source, with the code going public alongside the beta — so you'll be able to read exactly what the laptop does and doesn't do.

No surveillance features.

Ledger shows rules, refusals and time in each app — the same view the student can see. No screenshots, no keylogging, no location tracking, no message reading.

The student can see the rules.

Every change lands in a history both sides can read. Trust is easier when nobody is guessing.

How the lights stay on.

Optional support and convenience services for families who want them. The software itself is never the product.

Support the build

ScrivenerOS is free and stays free, so the costs sit on our side of the table — the reference laptop it’s tested on, and hosting the public update channels once they open. If you’d like to help carry those, it counts for a lot at this stage.

Support this project ♡
the roadmap

Where this is going.

The parts of the plan the outside world might actually care about. Internal plumbing not included.

Now

Beta on the Framework Laptop 12 in testing

Secure Boot on, the setup wizard, themes, the app picker and Learn your Linux. Dated test builds are running on real hardware, and nothing ships until a build has been signed off in person.

Next

Quill building

Pairing with Ledger, app hours, time-in-app accounting, and the launch gate that politely says "not right now."

Hours building

The countdown, the today view, forced reminders, and the "ask for more time" button that reaches the parent's phone.

Ledger building

The phone-first parent app: installed from the browser, works on the home network, reaches the laptop when you're away.

Website rules, per student building

The same focus / free / never rules, applied to websites — set per student and enforced by the laptop itself rather than by one browser's settings.

Learn your Linux, illustrated building

Fifteen topics, each with a drawn picture of the real thing on screen and a try-it step.

Planned

A Discord alternative planned ScrivenerOS only

A place to talk that only works between people on ScrivenerOS. No public servers, no strangers wandering in — if they aren't on ScrivenerOS, they aren't in the room.

A scriptorium installer planned

The install screens get the same illuminated look as everything after them.

Deeper appearance options planned

A matching icon set, window animations and color options that follow the chosen theme.

Public update channels planned

Signed images on a public registry with stable and testing channels, so your laptop's updates come from a source you can verify.

Later

Framework laptops, pre-installed later

Order a Framework with ScrivenerOS already on it and the wizard waiting at first boot.

Base Universal Blue's Bluefin (Fedora), image-based via bootc Desktop GNOME Boot stock Fedora shim, Secure Boot on Quill & Hours Python + GTK4 Ledger SvelteKit, installable web app Reference hardware Framework Laptop 12

Want in?

The beta is private while it's being tested on real laptops. When it opens up, the code opens with it — and you can hold us to the promises above.

Anarchy Games on GitHub → Support this project ♡ All projects