Launch HN: Terminal Use (YC W26) – Vercel for filesystem-based agents

The K8s-vs-agent-infra debate here is interesting. K8s gives you process and network isolation. What it doesn't give you: per-task authorization scope.

An agent container has a credential surface defined at deploy time. That surface doesn't change between task 1 ("read this repo") and task 2 ("process this user upload"). If the agent is prompt-injected during task 1, it carries the same permissions into task 2.

The missing primitives aren't infra — they're policy: what is this agent authorized to do with the data it can reach, on a per-task basis? Can it write, or only read? Can it exfil to an external URL, or only to /output? And crucially: is there an append-only record of what it actually did, so you can audit post-incident?

K8s handles the container boundary. The authorization layer above that — task-scoped grants, observable action ledger, revocation mid-task — isn't solved by existing infra abstractions. That gap is real regardless of whether you use K8s, Modal, or something like this.

This is really interesting, congrats on the launch. The use case I’m trying to solve for is building a coding agent platform that reliably sets up our development stack well. Few questions! In my case, I’m trying to build a one-shot coding agent platform that nicely spins up a docker-in-docker Supabase environment, runs a NextJS app, and durably listens to CI and iterates.

1) Can I use this with my ChatGPT pro or Claude max subscription? 2)

> We built Terminal Use to make it easier to deploy agents that work in a sandboxed environment and need filesystems to do work.

When I read this, I think of Fly.io's sprites.dev. Is that reasonable, or do you consider this product to be in a different space? If the latter, can you ELI5?

how does it compare to https://shellbox.dev? (and others like exe.dev, sprites.dev, and blaxel.ai)

have you guys found any of the existing nfs tools helpful (archil, daytona volumes, ...) or did you have to roll your own? i guess i have the same question for checkpointing/retrying too. it feels like the market of tools is very up in the air right now.

is this a replacement to langgraph?

Can you explain why everyone thinks we should use new tools to deploy agents instead of our existing infra?

eg. I already run Kubernetes