Yolobox
Dev tools
sandboxing for ai coding agents
SHOW HN2026
How HN took it
6 positive, 21 neutral or asking, 0 mixed, 8 critical, out of 35 comments about the project. Thread score -0.02.
Idea: 5 for, 4 againstPrivacy: 0 for, 3 againstDocs: 1 for, 0 againstDesign: 0 for, 1 against
The thread, comment by comment
Each row is a top-level comment and its replies, in HN's order. Select a cell to open that comment on HN.
positive neutral or mixed critical about another commenter or something else the maker
What HN said
What people liked
Useful idea that fills a need for safer agent execution.
From 2 comments
Nice. I love that the community as a whole is exploring all these different methods of containing undesirable side effects from using coding agents. This seems to lean towards…
akurilin on HNI was talking to ChatGPT about the best way to achieve this a few days ago. Thanks for getting something running and sharing it! I'll give this a try tomorrow, should be fun.
jcjmcclean on HN
Objections
Containers are not a robust isolation boundary; a VM is safer.
From 2 comments
Containers are not a robust way to isolate untrusted programs. A lightweight VM is probably the best balance between usability and security. They are effective at fostering a…
catlifeonmars on HNFrom “How it works” in the readme: > yolobox uses container isolation (Docker or Podman) as its security boundary… I have no issue with running agents in containers FWIW, just in…
catlifeonmars on HN
Current directory mounted read-write and config file mounts can enable escape.
From 1 comment
Ok that was super fun. Gemini managed to break out: I just redteamed this. The security model relies on the container boundary, but it implicitly trusts local configuration…
Finbarr on HN
Running agents locally is risky; a remote VM may be better.
From 2 comments
Is there a reason for wanting to run these agents on your own local machine, instead of just spinning up a VPS and scp'ing whatever specific files you want them to review, and…
forgingahead on HNAn alternative might be to run the agent in a VM in the cloud and use Syncthing or some other tool like that to move files back and forth. (I'm using exe.dev for the VM.)
skybrian on HN
Requests
Support for connecting to other docker containers from inside the sandbox.
From 2 comments
I do (most of) my development in docker containers. Usually a project will have a docker compose with web server, database etc. How can I use this so the yolobox container can…
gingerlime on HNThis is a good question and something I explored a little. I’ll need to do further research and come back on what the best option is. There’s a way to give a docker container…
Finbarr on HN
Documentation explaining the trust model.
From 1 comment
Thanks for sharing this! I've been experimenting with something similar. It would be helpful if the README explained how this works so users understand what they're trusting to…
mtlynch on HN
Option to disable yolo mode.
From 1 comment
great but can the yolo modes be disabled? I want only the isolation
rogeliodh on HN
Questions
How does it compare to devcontainers and built-in agent sandboxing?
From 2 comments
How would this compare with e.g. the .devcontainer docker files that AI coding companies like Claude Code provide already setup?
canadiantim on HNThere is a lot of chatter on Twitter and here about sandboxes for AI, however there appears to be a lack of awareness of the native built in sandboxing capabilities of Claude…
moderation on HN
Does it support rootless Podman or Podman machines?
From 1 comment
Thanks for sharing this! I've been experimenting with something similar. It would be helpful if the README explained how this works so users understand what they're trusting to…
mtlynch on HN
Alternatives named
Litterbox (Podman, Wayland socket support)
From 1 comment
Very cool! I've recently built something similar at https://github.com/Gerharddc/litterbox (https://litterbox.work/). Litterbox only works on Linux as it heavily relies on…
Gerharddc on HN
shai (read-only mounts, network restriction)
From 1 comment
Checkout https://github.com/colony-2/shai It runs locally. You can control which directories it has read / write access. You can control network traffic too.
LayeredDelay on HN
Bubblewrap scripts
From 1 comment
I always thought Docker/Podman is a bit overkill for this kind of thing. On Linux all you need is Bubblewrap. I did this as soon as I downloaded Claude Code as there was no way I…
globular-toast on HN
Devcontainers
From 2 comments
How would this compare with e.g. the .devcontainer docker files that AI coding companies like Claude Code provide already setup?
canadiantim on HNThis is basically a devcontainer, right?
woodson on HN
Distrobox and Toolbx
From 1 comment
how about https://containertoolbx.org/ ? or https://github.com/89luca89/distrobox ?
lazylizard on HN