Install guide

Get The Floor running.

A trading-firm cockpit that runs entirely on your own machine. Follow these steps — most people are up and running in about 5 minutes.

⏱ ~5 minutes · 🖥 macOS app · 🪟 Windows install pack · 🐧 Linux from source

Before you start

A quick checklist. macOS 12 or newer

A Mac or a Windows PC. Native Mac builds for Apple Silicon and Intel; Windows gets its own install pack below. (Linux: see “From source”.)
Python 3.11 or newer. The Floor's engine runs on it. Check in Terminal: $ python3 --version 3.11+ and you're set. Older, or “command not found”? Install it from python.org (or brew install python).
~150 MB of free space and an internet connection for the first launch.

The easy way recommended

Download the app, do a one-time first-open, and you're on the floor.

⬇ Mac · Apple Silicon (.dmg) ⬇ Mac · Intel (.dmg)

Not sure which Mac you have? → Apple About This Mac: “Apple M1/M2/M3/M4” = Apple Silicon; “Intel” = Intel.

Open the .dmg and drag to Applications
Double-click the downloaded file, then drag The Floor into your Applications folder.
First open: right-click → Open
Because the app isn't notarized yet, macOS asks once. Right-click (or Control-click) The Floor → Open → Open. After that, a normal double-click works.
Create your account
It starts its own engine on first launch (needs Python 3.11+ installed — the app tells you exactly what to do if it's missing), then opens the cockpit. Choose Create account and go.

Windows install pack

No terminal needed — a zip and a double-click. Same engine, same rule: everything stays on your PC.

⬇ Windows install pack (.zip)

Install Python 3.11+ (one-time)
Get it from python.org and tick “Add python.exe to PATH” in the installer.
Extract the zip
Right-click the download → Extract All… — anywhere you like (Documents works fine).
Double-click the-floor\scripts\start-floor.bat
It starts the engine and opens your desk at 127.0.0.1:9111/app. Keep the console window open while you work — closing it stops The Floor. Create your account and go.

From source developers · Linux

Already live in a terminal? The engine is plain Python (stdlib only, no pip installs) — it runs anywhere Python 3.11+ does.

Get the code
Download and unpack the source into your home folder:
$ curl -L https://premium.deadcatfound.org/download/the-floor-source.tar.gz | tar xz && mv the-floor ~/deadcat-console
Mac: run the installer
One command sets up the background engine (it finds your Python automatically) and builds The Floor.app:
$ bash ~/deadcat-console/scripts/install.sh
Wait for ✓ Service installed, then open The Floor from Applications.
Linux: run the engine directly
Start it, then open http://127.0.0.1:9111/app in your browser:
$ python3 ~/deadcat-console/server/app.py
Everything — desk, database, keys — stays on your machine, same as the Mac app. (On Windows, use the install pack above.)

Day to day on a Mac, just double-click The Floor. The engine stays running quietly in the background, so the app is always ready instantly.

If something's off

“Apple cannot check it for malware”

The app isn't code-signed yet, so macOS is cautious. Right-click the app → Open → Open. You only do this once.

“Python 3.11+ needed” / “command not found”

The Floor's engine needs Python 3.11 or newer (macOS's built-in 3.9 is too old). Install it from python.org or with brew install python, then quit and reopen The Floor (or re-run the installer).

The window is blank or won't load

The engine may not be running yet. Re-run bash ~/deadcat-console/scripts/install.sh, or check it's up with launchctl list | grep deadcat. Then reopen the app.

How do I uninstall it?

Run bash ~/deadcat-console/scripts/uninstall.sh. It removes the app and the background service but keeps your data (in ~/deadcat-console/data). On Windows, just delete the extracted the-floor folder.

Windows: the console window flashes and closes

That's the Python check failing. Install Python 3.11+ from python.org — and tick “Add python.exe to PATH” in its installer — then double-click start-floor.bat again.

/floor-setup says 401 or “can't reach The Floor”

A 401 means the token was mistyped or revoked — generate a fresh one in Settings → Prompt Kit access. “Connection refused” means The Floor isn't running: open The Floor.app first, then retry. If you run the console on a non-default port, tell /floor-setup when it asks.

🔒 It all stays on your machine. The Floor runs locally — your book, your keys, and your database live on your Mac, not in someone else's cloud.

Make it yours — the Prompt Kit no API key

The desk you're looking at is a replica — a cached copy of DeadCatFound's real playbook, so you can see what a running desk looks like. Nothing on it is live, and none of it is yours. The Prompt Kit is how it becomes yours.

The Floor is the body. The kit is the hands. The kit adds nine /floor-* skills to Claude Code — the AI you may already have. You talk to your own Claude in the terminal; it designs strategies, runs real backtests, and writes reports straight onto your Floor.

No API key, ever. The AI work runs in your Claude Code, on your existing subscription. The Floor just stores and renders what it produces.
Your compute, your machine. Backtests run locally with real market data. Nothing leaves your Mac except what your own Claude does.
Honest by design. The skills report losses as losses, refuse strategies without exit rules, and register everything as a draft — promotion is your call.

Install Claude Code (if you haven't)

The kit runs inside it. Get it at claude.com/claude-code, then run claude once in Terminal to sign in — that's the only sign-in the whole flow needs.
Install the kit

Your Floor serves it directly. One line in Terminal:
$ curl -s http://localhost:9111/kit.tar.gz | tar xz -C /tmp && bash /tmp/floor-kit/install.sh
On Windows, in PowerShell:
> curl.exe -s http://localhost:9111/kit.tar.gz -o "$env:TEMP\kit.tgz"; tar -xzf "$env:TEMP\kit.tgz" -C $env:TEMP; powershell -NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File "$env:TEMP\floor-kit\install.ps1"
Run this on the machine where your Floor is running (the app serves its own kit at that address).
Get your access token

In The Floor: Settings → Prompt Kit access → Generate token. Copy it — it's shown once.
Connect

In any Claude Code session:
> /floor-setup
Paste the token when it asks. It verifies the connection and tells you what you can do.
Build your first real thing

Try:
> /floor-strategy build me a mean-reversion strategy on QQQ
The moment it lands on your desk, the replica banner drops. It's Your Desk now.

The nine skills

/floor-setup — connect Claude Code to your Floor (one-time)
/floor-strategy — design a strategy together, registered on your desk
/floor-signal — wire a data feed, screener, or webhook as a signal
/floor-schedule — “every Monday at 10am, brief me on crypto” → a scheduled job
/floor-backtest — build & run a real backtest locally; honest results filed to your desk
/floor-broker — place paper (practice-money) trades from your terminal; keys stay in a local file, never on this site
/floor-report — author a desk report into your Reports tab
/floor-review — your whole desk, critiqued like a risk manager would
/floor-work — work the cloud Floor's AI job queue in your own Claude session (runner mode)

🐈‍⬛ Prefer to keep the replica? That's fine — it's a good showroom. It sits there, honestly labeled, until the first real thing you build replaces it. You can also clear it any time in Settings → Replica desk.

You're in

Take the tour, poke at the replica, or skip straight to making it yours.

Open your Floor → (on your machine)Install the Prompt Kit See what it does

That link opens the Floor running on your own computer (the app serves it at 127.0.0.1:9111). Using the hosted browser version instead? Open it from your Account page.