OpenDesign

OpenDesign is a local-first desktop workspace that turns the coding-agent CLIs already installed on your machine into a design engine. Instead of shipping its own agent, it detects the ones on your PATH and wires them into a full design loop: describe a brief, pick a starting template, set a visual direction, generate the artifact, then critique and deliver it. Artifacts are runnable files with real CSS, fonts, and components rather than canvas objects.

One project's Studio holds six artifact types beside the conversation and a sandboxed preview: web, desktop, and mobile prototypes; multi-slide decks; images; multi-page documents; live dashboards; and HyperFrames motion graphics, where the agent writes HTML, CSS, and GSAP that renders to MP4 through headless Chrome and FFmpeg. Exports cover HTML, PDF, PPTX, ZIP, Markdown, and MP4.

Composition happens on four planes, each a portable versioned directory anyone can author: plugins carry runnable workflows, skills carry agent behavior under the SKILL.md convention, design templates carry rendering blueprints, and design systems carry the brand. 151 design-system packages ship with the repository, centered on a DESIGN.md contract that every render reads; newer packages can add a manifest, compiled tokens, component fixtures, and assets. Handing the agent an existing repository plus a DESIGN.md refactors its components toward that spec.

Agents connect in two ways: as consumers of OpenDesign through skills, a CLI, and an MCP server, and as native runtimes that OpenDesign launches directly, with DeepSeek Harness wired through the official dsh CLI with structured streaming, model discovery, cancellation, and session resume. Supported entries include Claude Code, Claude Desktop, Codex CLI, Cursor, VS Code and GitHub Copilot, OpenCode, OpenClaw, Antigravity, Cline, Trae, Kimi CLI, Kiro, Pi Agent, Mistral Vibe CLI, Hermes, Raven, and DeepSeek Reasonix.

The desktop app runs on macOS and Windows, with a Linux AppImage on an optional release lane. Under it sits a Next.js front end in an Electron shell over a local Express and SQLite daemon that spawns the chosen CLI in the project's working directory and proxies bring-your-own-key model calls through an SSRF-guarded endpoint. A hosted model service is offered separately for agent and image models.

Features

• Agent-driven, model-agnostic: the claude, codex, cursor-agent, copilot, hermes, or kimi CLI already on your machine does the generation
• Six artifact types: prototypes, decks, images, documents, live dashboards, and HyperFrames motion graphics in one project
• HyperFrames video: HTML, CSS, and GSAP rendered to a deterministic MP4 through headless Chrome and FFmpeg
• Design systems: 151 DESIGN.md packages that every render reads, with your own added by dropping in a folder
• Skills and templates: 100+ functional skills plus a separate rendering-template catalog covering prototype, deck, image, video, and utility modes
• Plugins: a plugin catalog of runnable workflows, searchable in the app and launchable in place
• MCP install: od mcp install wires OpenDesign into a coding agent, with dry-run and uninstall options
• Native runtimes: adapters OpenDesign launches directly, including DeepSeek Harness through the dsh CLI
• Export formats: HTML, PDF, PPTX, ZIP, Markdown, and MP4 from a sandboxed iframe preview
• Local and BYOK: a local Express and SQLite daemon, an SSRF-guarded proxy, and any OpenAI-compatible endpoint
• Repo refresh: hand the agent a git repository and a DESIGN.md to refactor real components toward the brand spec