Terms of Service

The hosted service is operated by Tristan Manchester ("Bowline", "we", "us"), an independent developer based in Germany. By creating an account or using the hosted service, you agree to these terms. If you do not agree, do not use the service.

Bowline keeps one real ~/Code tree consistent across the machines and coding agents you authorize. The hosted service is the website at bowline.sh, your account, the dashboard, and the control plane that moves your workspace between devices. Git stays your tool for history and review. Bowline does not replace it.

You need an account to use the hosted service, and you must be at least 16 and able to enter a contract. Keep your login credentials and your Recovery Key safe, since they control access to your workspace. You are responsible for activity under your account. Tell us at hello@bowline.sh if you think your account or a device has been compromised.

Use the service for your own development work and within the law. Do not:

• access another user's workspace, account, or data;
• probe, break, or work around the security of the service;
• overload, disrupt, or interfere with the infrastructure;
• use the service to store or move unlawful content;
• resell the hosted service as your own.

You keep all rights to your code and data. You grant us only the limited permission needed to run the service: to store and transmit your workspace between the devices and agents you authorize. We claim no ownership of your content and do not use it beyond running the service for you. Section 4 of our Privacy Policy explains what we do and do not see.

Paid plans are billed through Polar, which acts as our Merchant of Record. Polar handles payment, invoicing, and any applicable taxes. Subscriptions renew for the period you chose until you cancel.

You can cancel at any time from your account or through Polar. Your plan then runs to the end of the current paid period. If you are a consumer in the EU, your statutory withdrawal and refund rights still apply. We may change prices, but we will give you notice first, and a change takes effect at your next renewal.

The Bowline CLI and daemon are open source under the Apache 2.0 license. Your use of that code is governed by that license, not these terms. These terms govern the hosted service and your account.

We work to keep the service reliable, but we provide it as it is and as available. We may run maintenance, change features, or offer beta features that are still rough. Where we reasonably can, we avoid breaking changes to core behavior.

Except where the law says otherwise, the hosted service is provided without warranties of any kind. We do not promise it will be uninterrupted or error-free. You are responsible for keeping your own backups and your Recovery Key. Nothing here limits rights you have under mandatory German or EU consumer law.

We are liable without limit for damage caused by intent or gross negligence, for injury to life, body, or health, and wherever German law otherwise requires. For slight negligence, we are liable only for breach of an essential contractual obligation, and only up to the foreseeable damage typical for this kind of contract.

All other liability is excluded. Mandatory statutory liability, including under the German Product Liability Act, is unaffected.

You can stop using the service and close your account at any time. We may suspend or end your access if you breach these terms or put the service or other users at risk. When your account closes, you can export your data during a reasonable window, after which we delete it as described in the Privacy Policy.

German law applies, excluding its conflict-of-law rules and the UN Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods. If you are a consumer, this choice does not remove the protection of mandatory law in your country of residence.

We may update these terms. We will post the new version with an updated date and, for material changes, give you notice before they take effect. If you keep using the service after that, the new terms apply.

Questions about these terms? Email hello@bowline.sh.