Requirements & detection

The current qualified desktop package targets Linux. It is built as an AppImage and contains an Electron shell plus the shared C3 client interface.

Tools on the machine

C3 Desktop reports, rather than guesses, whether it can find:

Component	Why it matters
`c3sync`	Creates and administers the shared hub
`c3bridge`	Connects this machine's Herdr sessions to the control plane
Herdr	Hosts the workspaces, panes, terminals, and coding agents
Git	Supports the surrounding development workflow

It also checks for an initialized hub bundle, an enrolled C3Sync device, configured bridge state, active Herdr control sockets, and the platform/architecture.

What is bundled

The desktop package includes the C3 renderer, the hardened Electron main process, SSH support for remote hub setup, and its terminal runtime. It does not bundle Herdr, c3sync, c3bridge, or a coding-agent CLI.

IMPORTANT — > Herdr is a separate project. Review its AGPL/commercial licensing before distributing it with any environment you manage.

Network paths

Local setup runs the installed CLIs directly on this machine.
Remote hub setup connects over SSH after showing the server's host-key fingerprint for confirmation.
Client control traffic connects from the Electron main process to the hub and uses the same pinned, end-to-end encrypted control protocol as C3 Mobile.

Next: guided setup.