Frequently asked questions

What is Shinro?

Shinro is a development environment for robotics: describe your robot, wire its behavior from visual modules, and compile it to one native binary that runs on the cake kernel. One environment to describe, compose, simulate, deploy, and observe robot software across heterogeneous hardware.

Is Shinro open source? What license does it use?

Shinro is fair-code rather than fully open source. Shinro Studio's source is in the open and free to use under fair-code terms. Community modules each carry their author's license — open source is encouraged. The cake kernel (the runtime) is commercially licensed and distributed as-is. (As of July 2026.)

How is Shinro different from Intrinsic Flowstate?

Both are visual development environments for robotics. Shinro is self-serve and source-available: Studio is free to use under fair-code terms, and the cake kernel deploys to your own hardware — from Jetson-class computers down to microcontrollers like ESP32. Intrinsic Flowstate is part of Intrinsic’s enterprise industrial-robotics platform. A detailed comparison is being prepared.

Does Shinro work with ROS?

Yes — ROS runs as a module. A ROS wrapper module bridges your existing ROS stack, so you keep its tooling for debugging and interop while the robot itself runs as one compiled native binary on the cake kernel.

Can I simulate before deploying to hardware?

Yes. Shinro Studio includes simulation with real-time physics for pre-hardware validation. The same modules then deploy natively to the device, with live telemetry streaming back once the robot is running.

What hardware and operating systems does Shinro support?

The cake kernel currently builds for Linux, Windows, Android, ESP32, Jetson, and Raspberry Pi; additional targets, including macOS, are added as toolchain modules are validated. Targets span arm64, x86-64, and MCU-class hardware. (As of July 2026.)

How do I install Shinro?

Shinro Studio runs in the browser — no install is needed to start; use the Try Shinro link on the landing page. Platform access is rolling out gradually: request early access with “Talk to us”. The docs at docs.shinro.dev walk through creating and building modules with the cake toolchain.