MacRecorder

Important: Installation can take a while because the installer downloads two ASR models upfront (Russian + English) so transcription is ready to use after setup. Quick start: You can install the prebuilt package from dist/MacRecorder-0.2.0.pkg. Prefer building yourself? See Build Everything Yourself at the end of this README.

MacRecorder is a macOS menu bar app that records microphone + system audio and generates transcripts with a local ASR engine.

Screenshots

What This Project Does

• Supports two transcription languages: Russian and English.
• Lets you create projects in advance with:
  • a destination folder,
  • default language,
  • optional post-transcription script.
• Saves output directly to your project folder (for example, an Obsidian vault folder so files appear there immediately).
• Starts transcription after you stop recording.
• Writes:
  • *.wav (audio),
  • *.txt (plain transcript),
  • *.json (structured transcript).

Stereo Recording and Source Separation

Audio is saved in stereo:

• Left channel: your microphone (mic/speak)
• Right channel: system speakers (speaker/speak)

The transcriber processes channels separately and tags segments with source labels. This is useful for summarization and diarization-like workflows.

Example:

[00:00:09] [ru][speaker/speak] Я, конечно, не знаю, что она есть.
[00:00:14] [ru][mic/speak] Okay.

Post Script

Each project can define a post script that runs when transcription is finished.

The script can receive paths to generated files via placeholders (and environment variables):

• TXT_PATH
• JSON_PATH
• AUDIO_PATH

Example use case: run codex exec to generate a summary from transcript/audio files.

Example command in project settings:

codex exec "Summarize the conversation from TXT_PATH and provide action items."

Architecture

• MacRecorder/: SwiftUI menu bar application
• engine/: Python transcription engine (onnx-asr based)
• Communication: JSON over stdin/stdout between Swift app and Python engine

Run Locally

Requirements:

• macOS 14+
• Swift 5.9+
• Python 3

Build and run:

make build
make run

Run Python engine tests:

make test

Build Installer

make installer

Output package:

• dist/MacRecorder-0.2.0.pkg

Build Everything Yourself

You can build the entire project from source:

1. Install prerequisites: macOS 14+, Swift 5.9+, Python 3.
2. Build app and Python engine:

make build

3. Run locally:

make run

4. Build installer package yourself:

make installer

The package will be generated in dist/.