Show HN: Zeroboot – sub-millisecond VM sandboxes using CoW memory forking

Re:Show HN: Zeroboot – sub-millisecond VM sandboxes using Co... by skwuwu on Tuesday March 17, 2026 @11:32AM (#47414113)

I noticed that you implemented a high-performance VM fork. However, to me, it seems like a general-purpose KVM project. Is there a reason why you say it is specialized for running AI agents?

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Re:Show HN: Zeroboot – sub-millisecond VM sandboxes using Co... by adammiribyan on Tuesday March 17, 2026 @12:12PM (#47414674)

Fair question. The fork engine itself is general purpose -- you could use it for anything that needs fast isolated execution. We say 'AI agents' because that's where the demand is right now. Every agent framework (LangChain, CrewAI, OpenAI Assistants) needs sandboxed code execution as a tool call, and the existing options (E2B, Daytona, Modal) all boot or restore a VM/container per execution. At sub-millisecond fork times, you can do things that aren't practical with 100-200ms startup: speculative parallel execution (fork 10 VMs, try 10 approaches, keep the best), treating code execution like a function call instead of an infrastructure decision, etc.

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Re:Show HN: Zeroboot – sub-millisecond VM sandboxes using Co... by shayonj on Wednesday March 18, 2026 @09:34AM (#47425625)

> you can do things that aren't practical with 100-200ms startup: speculative parallel execution (fork 10 VMs, try 10 approaches, keep the best), treating code execution like a function call instead of an infrastructure decision, etc.

i am not following, why isn't it practical?

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Re:Show HN: Zeroboot – sub-millisecond VM sandboxes using Co... by wamatt on Wednesday March 18, 2026 @10:15AM (#47426089)

Off the top of my head trading or realtime voice come to mind. Probably plenty other domains could benefit

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