# Conductor vs DeepSeek Harness (dsh) (slim)

> DeepSeek Harness scores 48.5 (D) to Conductor's 41.3 (E) for agent harnesses. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

- Full: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/conductor-vs-deepseek-harness.md (~6,800 tokens) · this version ~2,830 tokens · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/conductor-vs-deepseek-harness.json · canonical https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/conductor-vs-deepseek-harness
- Index: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms.txt · API: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/index.json · MCP: https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp · Updated: 2026-11-07
- Licence: CC BY 4.0, credit Anchor Terminal and link this page (https://www.anchorterminal.com/terms/#data)

DeepSeek Harness (dsh) scores 48.5 (D) on agent readiness against Conductor's 41.3 (E), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. Conductor leads on security & auth. Both do agent harnesses.

- Conductor: E 41.3, rank #1285 of 1486 · https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/conductor.min.md
- DeepSeek Harness (dsh): D 48.5, rank #1111 of 1486 · https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/deepseek-harness.min.md
- Conductor, good for Existing Conductor users planning their move before Cloud closes on 20 November 2026 and the local app winds down in early 2027. Ahead on Security & auth, 45 against 40. Also No incidents deducted, where DeepSeek Harness (dsh) loses 8 points for them.
- DeepSeek Harness (dsh), good for Developers who use DeepSeek models and want a scriptable harness with ACP, a JSON event stream and a Python SDK. Ahead on Reliability, 38 against 25; Schema & documentation, 77 against 60; Agent ergonomics, 68 against 55; Payments & pricing, 60 against 0; Maintenance & community, 71 against 58. Also Free to start without a card; Open source.

| Category | Conductor | DeepSeek Harness (dsh) |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability (16%) | 25 | 38 |
| Performance (10%) | pending | pending |
| Schema & documentation (13%) | 60 | 77 |
| Agent ergonomics (13%) | 55 | 68 |
| Security & auth (14%) | 45 | 40 |
| Payments & pricing (10%) | 0 | 60 |
| Task success (10%) | pending | pending |
| Maintenance & community (7%) | 58 | 71 |
| Transparency & trust (7%) | 53 | 53 |

| Fact (where they differ) | Conductor | DeepSeek Harness (dsh) |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Vendor | Conductor (joining Meta) | DeepSeek |
| Auth | OAuth or key | API key |
| Pricing | Paid | Free |
| Licence | Proprietary. A closed-source Mac app and hosted Conductor Cloud under Conductor's terms | MIT |
| llms.txt | no | yes |
| Last release | 2026-11-04 | 2026-10-17 |
| Terms last updated | not read yet | no document linked |
| Privacy policy last updated | not read yet | no document linked |
| Popularity | none | 245k npm/wk |
| Agent reviews | none | 3/5 (4) |

Why the edge:
- Payments & pricing, DeepSeek Harness (dsh) +60: Conductor 0 (No new sign-ups since 4 November, free users can't upgrade, and no price is shown. No protocol, no published price, no open free tier, no onboarding (0).); DeepSeek Harness (dsh) 60 (Self-hosted rule, as for the other open-source harnesses. No payment protocol (0). The harness is free under MIT with nothing to buy (20). No card or account is needed for the software, and custom endpoints include self-hosted model servers (20). An agent can install it with npx or pip and run it with no sign-up, given a model endpoint (20). DeepSeek's API is a separate purchase. 0 + 20 + 20 + 20 = 60.)
- Schema & documentation, DeepSeek Harness (dsh) +17: Conductor 60 (Harness reading. Docs for workspaces, review and merge, a Conductor API reference page linked from the docs (not read), and security and permissions pages (60).); DeepSeek Harness (dsh) 77 (Framework reading. `--dump-config-schema` prints a JSON Schema 2020-12 document for the composed configuration and patch layers, the headless `--json` event vocabulary is documented, and ACP v1 and the SDK's JSON-RPC are named protocols, though the reference calls the schema output pre-stable (22). llms.txt on the docs site, with a raw Markdown address for every page (10). Package READMEs have use and avoid sections and known limitations, such as headless being one task per run (17). Permission presets, sandbox modes, approval policies and telemetry modes are closed enums (13). Examples for every mode, exit codes 0 and 1, `dsh: <code>: <message>` on stderr, `error` events in `--json` and startup failure reports under `$DSH_HOME/logs/` (12). Versions are on npm and PyPI, with generated CLI help, but no public changelog was found (3). Per-version upgrade guides since 29 September 2026 name breaking changes, still with no changelog (the versioning line stays partly met). 22 + 10 + 17 + 13 + 12 + 3 = 77.)
- Reliability, DeepSeek Harness (dsh) +13: Conductor 25 (Read as local software that is winding down. Installed from Conductor's own download, which stopped taking new users on 4 November 2026 (10). Closed source, so no public CI or issue tracker (0, 0). A dated changelog, newest 0.93.0 on 4 November (15). Version 0.93 (0). 10 + 0 + 0 + 15 + 0 = 25.); DeepSeek Harness (dsh) 38 (Local-package reading, graded on npm `latest`, which the README's `npx @deepseek-ai/dsh` installs (0.2.0-rc.2 per the 18 October check; npm not re-read on 4 November). Official npm package with Node 22.19+ and 24+ stated, and a Python wheel for Python 3.10+ on Linux x64 and arm64, macOS 14+ on arm64 and Windows x64 that bundles the runtime (20). Public CI. ci.yml runs static checks, the coverage gate and consumer tests on every pull request, and ci-master.yml runs `pnpm run check:ci` on every push to master, but run results couldn't be read, so whether master passes is unconfirmed (15, this run's reading for public CI that runs the tests with an unreadable result). CONTRIBUTING.md sends bug reports to GitHub Discussions and refuses external pull requests. Discussions and issues couldn't be read (GitHub's pages answer 403), so crash reports and their handling are unchecked and scored absent (0). Alpha, next and latest dist-tags separate channels. Since 29 September 2026 the repository keeps dated upgrade guides per pre-release under docs/upgrade-guide (12 versions to 0.2.2-alpha.3), each naming breaking changes and migrations, but every version is still an alpha or rc and there is no changelog, so the line stays partly met (3). Developer preview, no 1.0 or stable release (0). 20 + 15 + 0 + 3 + 0 = 38.)
- Agent ergonomics, DeepSeek Harness (dsh) +13: Conductor 55 (Harness reading. Each task gets a workspace, branch, terminal and diff, with pull requests and merges from the app, and an API for integrations; not re-read in detail (55).); DeepSeek Harness (dsh) 68 (Harness reading, scored on what a pipeline driving it has to supply. Profiles compose the tool set from plugins, `sdk-minimal` exposes three tools, and no MCP server is enabled by default (18). Automatic context compaction and a 300-second shell timeout in `sdk-minimal`, but no turn, time or cost limit was found for headless runs (8). Exit 0 for a completed turn and 1 otherwise, stderr diagnostics, and an NDJSON stream with `session`, `final` and `error` events, though a failed in-turn run still ends with `final` (15). `--session-id` resumes a persisted session, ACP has `session/list`, `session/resume` and `session/cancel`, and an unanswered approval is denied rather than left hanging (16). One-argument headless runs, ACP and a Python SDK, and the repository also holds a TypeScript SDK client (`@deepseek-ai/dsh-sdk-client`) that the Python guide mentions once. Whether it is published on npm wasn't read, and a model key is required, so the line stays partly met (11). 18 + 8 + 15 + 16 + 11 = 68.)
- Maintenance & community, DeepSeek Harness (dsh) +13: Conductor 58 (0.93.0 on 4 November 2026 (30). Several dated releases in 90 days, per the changelog index (20). Discord, a subreddit and email for support (8). Closed app, no package or CI to read (0). 30 + 20 + 8 + 0 + 0 = 58. The local app gets new models and critical fixes only until early 2027.); DeepSeek Harness (dsh) 71 (Recency follows what a default install gets. npm `latest` was 0.2.0-rc.2 (29 September 2026) on 18 October and wasn't re-read, and the release script only moves `latest` for a version without a pre-release suffix. `pip install deepseek-harness-sdk`, the documented Python install, picks the newest pre-release when no final version exists, and PyPI carried 0.2.1rc2 on 17 October per the 18 October feed reading (30). 38 `dsh-v` tags from 17 August to 4 November 2026 in a clone of 4 November, the newest 0.2.2-rc.1 today, and the Python SDK ships with each release per the 18 October reading (20). CONTRIBUTING.md says the team can't accept external pull requests and may not reply to every Discussions post. The clone shows 25,848 commits, 9,645 of them merges, which says little about replies to users. Reply times in Discussions are unchecked (5). The Python SDK ships with each release, still as a pre-release (10). CI runs on pull requests and on master pushes, with its current state unconfirmed (6). 30 + 20 + 5 + 10 + 6 = 71.)
- Security & auth, Conductor +5: Conductor 45 (Closed app. Telemetry and data handling weren't read beyond the transition notice (10 of 30). A security and permissions page (10 of 20). No prompt-injection guidance found (5). No audit log found (5). SOC 2 Type II report at trust.conductor.build (15 of 20). 10 + 10 + 5 + 5 + 15 = 45.); DeepSeek Harness (dsh) 40 (Harness reading of the framework checklist, 30 for what leaves the machine by default, 20 for approvals and sandboxing, 15 for prompt-injection posture, 15 for audit and 20 for the security programme. The session-log contributor is on by default and sends complete unaccepted session-log events (message text, tool arguments and results, workspace paths) with every request to DeepSeek's official API, up to 8 MiB a request. Since 18 October plugins can register exclusions per request, and the default is unchanged. OpenTelemetry defaults to `FEEDBACK_ONLY` and sends the session prefix to dsh-otel-collector.deepseeksvc.com after any feedback or rating. Both are documented with opt-outs in the CLI reference and package READMEs, but not in the README or SAFETY.md. Keys stay local (8). `workspace-write` plus `ask` by default, with writes confined by bwrap, Landlock, Seatbelt or a Windows ACL runner, and an unanswered ask denied in headless and ACP runs. Reads and network are not confined, `web_fetch` runs without approval, and the SDK's `sdk-minimal` profile pins `danger-full-access` with no approval service. On the graded line `web_fetch` refuses non-public destinations, but commit 2f01ad5 (20 October 2026, in 0.2.2-alpha.2 and later pre-releases) removed that check, so newer builds reach loopback, private-network and cloud metadata hosts, as its upgrade guide states (13, held for the graded line). SAFETY.md warns of malicious input and untrusted plugins, MCP server names are treated as untrusted, and no MCP server is enabled by default, but no prompt-injection guidance was found, and CVE-2026-95183 reports injection through context compaction (6). Local JSONL session logs record approval decisions as audit events (12). No SECURITY.md or security policy file in a clone of 4 November, no security.txt (per the 18 October check), no bug bounty, and no advisory published by the project. GitHub's reviewed database carries GHSA-8m2g-8cgm-3vcp for CVE-2026-82533, written by GitHub from the CVE. SAFETY.md says the project has had no security audit, and eight of the twelve CVE records say the vendor did not respond (1). 8 + 13 + 6 + 12 + 1 = 40.)