Installation

Builds require Zig 0.16.0. VM execution requires hardware virtualization:

Backend	Host requirement
HVF	Apple Silicon macOS, signed hypervisor entitlement
KVM	Linux x86-64, access to /dev/kvm

Build from source

git clone https://github.com/justinGrosvenor/nether.git
cd nether
zig build test
zig build -Dtarget=x86_64-linux

The default target is x86-64 Linux. Host tests run on the build host without booting a VM. A successful cross-build is not a backend runtime check.

On Apple Silicon:

zig build -Dtarget=native
./zig-out/bin/nether

The native macOS default build signs the installed binary with the hypervisor entitlement. Use that installed path to run it. zig build run uses a cached build artifact, which is not the path signed by the install step.

-Dcodesign=false disables automatic signing. For an explicit signing or verification command, see code signing. Explicit zig build install also bypasses the default signing step.

If native linking cannot find the SDK when Xcode.app is selected:

DEVELOPER_DIR=/Library/Developer/CommandLineTools zig build -Dtarget=native
DEVELOPER_DIR=/Library/Developer/CommandLineTools zig build test

On a KVM host, run the Linux artifact with ./zig-out/bin/nether. Without guest artifacts, each backend runs its built-in serial smoke guest.

Full guests and integration

• HVF runbook: ARM Image/initramfs preparation.
• KVM runbook: PVH kernel and initramfs.
• Provisioning: warm HVF base recipes.
• Stack status: gateway, supervisor, VM, and console boundaries.

The current Swerver integration launches Nether as separate VM processes. The library exports in src/root.zig are available for embedding work, but the proposed single-process gateway integration is not the current topology.