Harness² vs Sculptor

Harness² 36

0.1.0, first committed on 8 October 2026, with a README fix on 13 October (30). No tags, releases or dated changelog entries (0). 42 pull requests (41 from outside contributors, one from Dependabot) and 6 issues open on 18 October, against one pull request and no issues closed. No outside change is on main, which has three commits by the authors, and reply times couldn't be read (3 of 25). Not on PyPI and no SDK (0). No CI. Dependencies are pinned by version and upstream checkouts by commit, a ruff configuration is in pyproject.toml, and Dependabot's litellm bump of 8 October is still open (3 of 10). 36 in all.

Sculptor 75

Commits on 6 November 2026 and frequent tagged versions (30). More than three releases in 90 days (20). GitHub issues and pull requests weren't read (GitHub's pages refuse these sessions), so that line is scored absent; the README says Imbue can't take many outside contributions yet (0). Current official downloads (15). CI on pull requests (10). 30 + 20 + 0 + 15 + 10 = 75.

Harness² 20

Local-package reading. Not on PyPI (the release feed for harness2 answers 404). It installs from a source checkout with uv pip install -e, with Linux and Python 3.12 stated (the package allows 3.13), plus Node.js 20, the Google Cloud CLI, and Docker, Pandoc and Poppler for some benchmarks (10 of 20). No CI workflow in the repository. tests/test_workflow.py holds five unit tests over the deterministic demo, which needs no credentials (5 of 25). Six issues and 42 pull requests were open on 18 October, the pull requests mostly fixes by their titles, such as the missing .env.example, report failures, seeds lost between refinement and grading, and resume. None is merged and no issue is closed. Issue text and replies couldn't be read (5 of 25). No tags or changelog (0). Version 0.1.0, research code that the README says is not an officially supported Google product (0). 20 in all.

Sculptor 43

Local software. Desktop downloads for Mac (Apple Silicon), Linux and Linux ARM64 (20). checks.yml and a PR gate run on the repository; pass state not read (15). GitHub issues and pull requests weren't read (GitHub's pages refuse these sessions), so that line is scored absent (0). sculptor-v tags up to v0.49.0, no changelog file (8). 0.x and labelled a research preview (0). 20 + 15 + 0 + 8 + 0 = 43.

Harness² 40

No payment protocol (0). Read with the self-hosted rule, as for the other harnesses. Free under Apache-2.0 with nothing to buy (20). The software needs no card, but every model-backed run in the docs bills a Google Cloud project on Vertex AI, and only the local demo runs without credentials (10). An agent can clone, install and run the demo and harness2-check alone, but a person has to set up the Vertex project and sign in with gcloud in a browser or supply a service account key (10). 40 in all.

Sculptor 60

Free self-hosted software with nothing to buy, so 0 for a protocol and 20 each for public pricing, a free tier and onboarding with no sign-up, 60.

Harness² 44

Harness reading of the framework checklist, as for the other harnesses. 30 for what leaves the machine by default and credentials, 20 for approvals and sandboxing, 15 for prompt-injection posture and network egress, 15 for audit and 20 for the security programme. No telemetry found in the Harness² source, and the WorkBuddy OpenCode configs turn OpenCode's telemetry, auto-update and sharing off. Credentials are Google Application Default Credentials, and the Codex bridge binds 127.0.0.1 by default with a generated key stored with mode 0600. Against that, executors inherit the whole shell environment (the editor channel drops only five Anthropic variables), and no .gitignore keeps a filled-in .env out of commits (20). Codex runs with --dangerously-bypass-approvals-and-sandbox, the Claude CLI editor channel with --dangerously-skip-permissions, and the WorkBuddy OpenCode preset allows every tool, with only OpenCode's directory fence and WorkBuddy's containers as limits. The README and setup guide say so (4). Executor network access is unrestricted by default. The docs name the hosts to block and report a Codex rollout that fetched its rubric unprompted, but give no guidance on instructions inside task documents (5). Each editor call's prompt, system text, response, model and cost are saved to an audit folder, with trajectories and adopted harnesses under runs/ (13). No SECURITY.md or security.txt and no advisories, and the README says the project is outside Google's open-source vulnerability rewards programme (2). 44 in all.

Sculptor 57

Harness reading. Product analytics, error reporting and session recording default to off in the user config, and the app asks for a telemetry level and privacy consent at first run; PostHog runs on the front end only for now (25 of 30). Each workspace is an isolated copy of the code (14 of 20). No prompt-injection guidance (5). No audit log (5). SECURITY.md (8). 25 + 14 + 5 + 5 + 8 = 57.

Harness² 59

Framework reading, adapted to a harness that a pipeline drives. Results land in run folders, not in the caller's context, and an agent reads task summaries, adopted harnesses and reflection notes from runs/ (12 of 25). --only-domains, --max-tasks (per domain), --split-file, --workers and --dry-run size a run before any model call (14 of 20). harness2-check tests dependencies, credentials and configuration without a model call, configuration errors name the remedy, and incomplete runs exit nonzero (14 of 20). Rerunning a command resumes it, saved configuration refuses an incompatible resume, failed grades stay unscored, and editor replies are cached by a fingerprint of their inputs (15 of 20). No model has a default, a Vertex AI project and a gcloud sign-in are needed, only three benchmarks are accepted and there's no SDK (4 of 15). 59 in all.

Sculptor 50

Harness reading. Workspaces as isolated copies, review and merge back, and built-in skills (50).

Harness² 49

Apache-2.0 under Google LLC, with each bundled runner's licence and provenance file and a hash list. The WorkBuddy runners carry Tencent's custom licence, which has an EU territorial limitation (26 of 30). The docs list every host setup contacts and say credentials, generated configuration and run artefacts are not release assets. No privacy statement covers the package, and task data goes to the configured model provider (12 of 30). No deprecation policy or notices for the 0.1.0 research release (0). No telemetry found in the source, and the docs don't say either way. OpenCode's telemetry is turned off only in the WorkBuddy configs (10 of 20). 48 in all.

Sculptor 57

MIT (30). Consent-based telemetry documented in the repository (18 of 30). The README warns of drastic changes during the research preview, with no deprecation policy (5). Opt-in telemetry (20). 30 + 18 + 5 + 20 = 73.