Installation

SOW is one executable: there is no service to enable and no runtime language environment. Release builds target Linux and macOS on amd64 and arm64; Linux also gets RPM and DEB packages. Windows is not supported.

Use the Download page to select the archive or Linux package that matches your operating system and architecture. It links each published artifact, its source tag, and SHA256SUMS.

Install an archive

Download one archive plus SHA256SUMS, then verify the matching line before extraction:

# Linux amd64
grep 'sow_.*_linux_amd64.tar.gz$' SHA256SUMS | sha256sum -c -
tar -xzf sow_*_linux_amd64.tar.gz
sudo install -m 0755 sow /usr/local/bin/sow

On macOS, select darwin_amd64 or darwin_arm64 and replace sha256sum -c - with shasum -a 256 -c -. Without root, install to a directory already on your PATH, such as ~/.local/bin.

Install a Linux package

Linux packages use the 1PGSTY release suffix:

sudo rpm -Uvh ./sow-*-1PGSTY.x86_64.rpm
sudo apt install ./sow_*-1PGSTY_amd64.deb

Choose only the command and architecture that match the host. RPM installs the license at /usr/share/licenses/sow/LICENSE; DEB installs copyright/license metadata under /usr/share/doc/sow/.

Build from source

The module declares Go 1.27.0. Metadata generation needs no C toolchain. Replace vX.Y.Z with the source tag linked from the Download page:

git clone https://github.com/pgsty/sow.git
cd sow
set -euo pipefail
SOW_TAG=vX.Y.Z
git checkout "$SOW_TAG"
SOW_VERSION="${SOW_TAG#v}"
CGO_ENABLED=0 go build -trimpath \
  -ldflags="-s -w -X github.com/pgsty/sow/internal/v2cli.Version=${SOW_VERSION}" \
  -o sow ./cmd/sow
sudo install -m 0755 sow /usr/local/bin/sow

This uses the release build flags and embeds the selected tag’s product version.

Verify

sow version
sow help

sow version reports product version, target OS/architecture, and build Go toolchain. sow help lists the command tree. Each archive also contains README.md, CHANGELOG.md, and the Apache-2.0 LICENSE.

Upgrade a 0.3 Managed Workspace

SOW 0.4 introduces internal database schemas v11 and v12. The public layout and schema: sow/v3 configuration identifier stay the same, but each existing v0.3 Repository must be migrated explicitly before ordinary reads or writes. Stop Workspace writers before taking the backup:

cp -a /srv/sow /srv/sow.backup-before-0.4.0
sow repo migrate REPOSITORY -C /srv/sow
sow check -r REPOSITORY -C /srv/sow

Repeat the last two commands for every Repository named in sow.yml. The database transition is one-way; do not reopen a migrated Workspace with SOW 0.3. See sow repo migrate for the repaired status, signer, and publication evidence.

Permissions and optional tools

The invoking user needs read access to package inputs and write access to the Plain target or Managed workspace. Keep Managed workspaces on a local POSIX filesystem: locks, fsync, safe paths, and atomic rename are part of the correctness contract.

Repository parsing and metadata rendering are in-process. Only two optional paths need host tools:

• RPM package signing requires rpm and a working GPG environment;
• an agent:// metadata key requires gpg and gpg-agent.

Next: Quick Start for Plain mode, or First Workspace for Managed mode.