👁️ PeekOCR

OCR, screenshots, GIF clips, and annotations — from your macOS menu bar

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✨ What is PeekOCR?

PeekOCR is a macOS menu bar app that lets you quickly select an area of your screen to:

• copy extracted text (OCR) to the clipboard,
• save screenshots (optionally annotated),
• and record short GIF clips (ideal for sharing UI bugs/animations).

🎯 Features

Feature	Description
📸 OCR Capture	Select an area and copy the extracted text
🔗 QR Detection	Detect and copy QR contents
📷 Screenshots	Save images with configurable format/quality/scale
✍️ Live Annotation Capture	Select, adjust, annotate in-place, then export
🎞️ GIF Clip Capture	Record up to 10s, trim, preview, and export as GIF
🛡️ Guided permissions	In-app reminders, live permission status, and a guided System Settings flow
🔊 Capture sound	Optional shutter feedback on save (toggle + volume in Settings)
🕘 History	Quickly access your last 6 captures
⌨️ Hotkeys	Customize global shortcuts in Settings

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🚀 Installation

1. Download the latest version from Releases
2. Open the DMG and drag PeekOCR.app to your Applications folder
3. Launch PeekOCR
4. Open any capture mode, or use the menu bar reminder, to review and enable the required permissions with the guided setup flow

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⌨️ How to Use

Default Keyboard Shortcuts

All shortcuts can be changed in Settings.

Action	Shortcut
Capture text (OCR)	⇧ Space
Capture screenshot	⌘⇧4
Capture with annotations	⌘⇧5
Capture GIF clip (max 10s)	⌘⇧6

Quick Start

OCR

1. Press ⇧ Space
2. Drag to select a region
3. The extracted text is copied to your clipboard

Annotated screenshot

1. Press ⌘⇧5
2. Drag to create the capture area
3. Adjust the selection by dragging corners or moving the region
4. Add arrows, text, or highlights directly on the live overlay
5. Move existing annotations inline, resize highlight boxes, and edit text with double click
6. Use ⌘Z to undo the last live annotation change
7. Press Enter to capture and export the final annotated image

GIF Clip

1. Press ⌘⇧6
2. Select a region
3. Record (auto-stops at 10s or stop early)
4. Trim in/out in the editor and export as a GIF

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🔐 Permissions

PeekOCR needs two permissions to work properly:

Permission	Why
Screen Recording	Capture screen content
Accessibility	Register global hotkeys

PeekOCR does not interrupt you with permission prompts on launch. If one of these permissions is missing, the app shows an in-app reminder and a guided window that opens the correct System Settings pane when you choose to continue.

The requirements window keeps both permissions visible, marks granted permissions in green, and refreshes the status when you come back from System Settings. Accessibility usually updates right away; Screen Recording can still depend on how macOS applies the change on your machine.

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💻 Requirements

• macOS 13.0 (Ventura) or later
• Apple Silicon or Intel Mac

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⚡ Performance and Stability

PeekOCR is designed to live in the macOS menu bar for long periods, so the project now prioritizes:

• OCR and image processing off the UI-critical path
• lower transient memory usage during screenshot save/export
• cleanup of temporary/partial export files on failures
• no leaked keyboard event monitors in settings
• fewer long-running polling timers in resident UI

📚 Documentation

• AGENTS.md (project map, conventions, and release guardrails)
• CLAUDE.md (thin wrapper that imports AGENTS.md for Claude Code)
• CHANGELOG.md
• docs/ARCHITECTURE.md
• docs/SERVICES.md
• docs/MODELS.md
• docs/VIEWS.md
• docs/GIF_CLIP.md

📝 License

MIT License — use and modify freely

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Made with ❤️ for the macOS community