Clip

A minimal native macOS menu-bar clipboard history. Layers of what you copied, newest on top.

Press ⇧⌘V, a list appears; type to filter, ↑↓ to move, ⏎ pastes into the app you were in, ⎋ closes. Press ⇧⌘V again while it is open to step down the list. The menu bar item lists the last ten for the mouse. Text only.

Requirements

• macOS 14 (Sonoma) or later
• Accessibility permission, for Clip to send ⌘V on your behalf. Without it the pick still lands on the pasteboard and you paste yourself.
• Quit Flycut (or any other app bound to ⇧⌘V) — Carbon lets only one process own a hotkey and Clip will log the failure rather than fight.

Build

./scripts/build-app.sh      # → /Applications/Clip.app, signed, icon regenerated

Needs xcodegen and the sibling ../housekit package, which supplies the menu bar plate, the app icon, the settings window chrome and launch-at-login — the pieces Clip shares with Tessellate and Cargo. To work in Xcode instead: xcodegen generate && open Clip.xcodeproj.

Signing uses the stable Apple Development identity from project.yml for the same reason Tessellate does: TCC ties the Accessibility grant to the code signature, and an ad-hoc build loses it on every rebuild. Set your own DEVELOPMENT_TEAM first.

Downloadable releases

Push a tag matching CFBundleShortVersionString (e.g. v0.1.0) to run .github/workflows/release.yml: universal build, Developer ID signature, notarization, a ZIP plus SHA256SUMS on the GitHub Release. Same secrets as Tessellate's workflow (APPLE_TEAM_ID, the Developer ID certificate, an App Store Connect API key).

Privacy

• Copies marked org.nspasteboard.ConcealedType / TransientType (what password managers set) are never recorded.
• Apps in the ignore list (1Password and Keychain Access by default) are skipped.
• History lives in ~/Library/Application Support/Clip/clippings.json, local only.

URL scheme

clip://show opens the picker, clip://settings the settings window.

Configuration

Settings lives in the menu bar item (⌘,): History (shortcut, how many to keep, how many in the menu, ignored apps) · General (launch at login, menu bar icon, Accessibility status) · About.

Architecture

AppKit throughout, no SwiftUI, no dependencies beyond HouseKit.

Clipboard/PasteboardWatcher	Polls changeCount every 300 ms — there is no notification API
Clipboard/Paster	Writes the pasteboard, then a CGEvent ⌘V if Accessibility allows
Picker/PickerPanel	Non-activating floating NSPanel, so the target app keeps focus
HouseKit.GlobalHotkey / ShortcutRecorder	Carbon RegisterEventHotKey and the shortcut control, shared with Tessellate
Storage/ClippingStore	Newest-first, de-duplicated, capped; JSON file + UserDefaults settings
Settings/HistoryPage	Clip's page in the HouseKit settings window, next to the shared General and About pages
App/ClipApp	NSStatusItem and its menu — header, recent clippings, then the house tail (Settings, Launch at Login, Quit)