SnipSnap

A lightweight, privacy-first native macOS utility. Seamlessly combines precision screenshots, vector annotations, scrolling capture, GIF recording, tactile pinning, on-device offline OCR, and in-place screen/input translation.

English | 简体中文

---

Interface Overview

Precision Viewfinder & Color Loupe	Rich Vector Annotation Arsenal
Hairline crosshair · 8x live loupe · Real-time HEX/RGB	Geometric shapes · Curved arrows · Highlighters · Mosaic · Step pins

Smart Seamless Scrolling Capture	Safari-Style In-Place Screen Translation
Auto-stitching on scroll · Compact status capsule · Panorama preview	On-device Vision OCR · Contextual overlay · Language pairs · DeepSeek AI

Input Field Translation & Replacement	Desktop Floating Pin & Tactile Gestures
Focus & translate · Enter to replace · Preserved clipboard history	Independent NSPanel · 10%–800% zoom · ⌘L click-through · Context menu

---

Key Features

1. 📸 Precision Screenshots & Vector Annotations

• Pixel-Level Accuracy: Hairline crosshair paired with an 8x live magnifying loupe displaying exact coordinates and HEX colors. Press C to copy the inspected color code.
• Rich Annotation Arsenal: Rectangles, ellipses, straight lines, smooth arrows, freehand brush, highlighter, text notes, pixelated mosaic/blur, and auto-incrementing step badges ① ② ③.
• Undo & Redo: Multi-step undo (⌘Z) and redo (⇧⌘Z), with one-click file saving or copying to the clipboard.

2. 📜 Scrolling Capture & Auto-Stitching

• Continuous Downward Stitching: Select any scrollable region (webpages, source code, long documents, or chat logs) and scroll down; SnipSnap automatically aligns overlapping frames into a seamless image.
• Panoramic Live Preview: A compact status capsule displays live height and frame count, expanding on hover to reveal a high-resolution panorama roll.

3. 🎞️ Region GIF Screen Recording

• Box & Record: Select any screen region and record directly to an optimized GIF at a rock-solid 15 FPS.
• Flexible Controls: Freely pause and resume during recording. Finished recordings are automatically copied to the clipboard and saved to disk.

4. 📌 Stepless Pinning & Text-to-Card

• Always-on-Top Floating Pin: Pinned images float across all virtual desktops, Spaces, and full-screen windows for persistent reference.
• Intuitive Gestures: Smooth zoom scaling (10%–800%) via trackpad pinch or scroll wheel, opacity adjustment (1–9), rotation (R), and flipping (H/V).
• Mouse Click-Through: Press ⌘L to enable pass-through mode, turning the pin into a non-intrusive background reference.
• Text & Code Cardification: Copy text or code and press F3; SnipSnap formats and renders it into a sleek frosted code card pinned directly on your screen.

5. 🔍 On-Device Offline OCR & Selection Translation

• 100% Local Character Recognition: Powered by the Apple Vision framework and Neural Engine; private texts and credentials never leave your Mac.
• Safari-Style In-Situ Translation: Recognized text is directly typeset and rendered over the original image. Tap Space to toggle between original and translated versions instantly.
• Multi-Engine Support: Seamlessly switch between Apple native offline translation, DeepL official API, and customizable AI engines (DeepSeek / OpenAI / Ollama).

6. ✍️ Input Field Translation & Replacement

• Instant Input Translation: Focus on any input field (or select a piece of text) and press the shortcut (default ⇧F4) to bring up the translation capsule.
• One-Key Overwrite: Press Enter or click the green "Replace" button to overwrite the original text in the target application. Your original clipboard content is automatically restored afterward.

7. ⚡ Pure Native & Ultra-Lightweight

• Swift & AppKit Architecture: Built without heavy Electron or web wrappers. Cold-starts in milliseconds with near-zero idle memory footprint.
• Menu Bar Resident & Global Hotkeys: Runs quietly in the status bar. All action shortcuts are fully customizable via the native preferences panel.

---

Shortcut Cheatsheet

Shortcut	Action
F1 / ⌥A	Standard screenshot capture
⌥F1 / ⌥S	Scrolling capture mode
⇧F1 / F2 / ⌥O	Selection OCR & in-place translation
⇧F4	Input field translation & replacement
F3 / ⌥P	Pin clipboard image / Convert text to card
F4	Quick clipboard translation
C	Copy HEX color under crosshair
⌘L	Toggle pin mouse pass-through (Lock mode)
Space	Toggle Original / Translated text in translation HUD
Enter	Confirm annotation / Execute translation replacement / Finish recording
Esc	Cancel and exit current action

Note: All shortcuts can be customized in Preferences -> Shortcuts.

---

Installation

1. Homebrew Cask (Recommended)

brew install --cask iskf/snipsnap/snipsnap

To update in the future:

brew upgrade --cask snipsnap

2. Manual DMG Download

Download the latest .dmg release from GitHub Releases, open it, and drag SnipSnap.app into your Applications folder.

3. Build from Source

Requires macOS 14.0+ and Xcode 15+ command line tools:

git clone https://github.com/iskf/SnipSnap.git
cd SnipSnap
./build_app.sh
open build/SnipSnap.app

---

Permissions & Privacy

• Screen Recording: Required by macOS to capture screen pixels, scrolling captures, and record GIFs.
• Accessibility: Required to listen to global hotkeys and to read/replace text in active input fields.
• Zero Tracking: SnipSnap contains zero analytics, telemetry, or tracking code. OCR and core translations run entirely on-device.

---

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License.