GhostMind

GhostMind is a stealth AI overlay for Windows. It stays above other windows as a semi-transparent, frameless panel that is hidden from the taskbar and Alt+Tab, and is excluded from most screen-capture APIs so it stays off Zoom, Teams, OBS, and similar tools (OS-dependent). It can OCR the selected monitor, transcribe microphone (and optional system loopback) audio with local Whisper, and send context to Claude (Anthropic) for concise answers inside the app.

Features

• Always-on-top, draggable, resizable overlay with custom edge handles
• Windows extended styles: tool window (no taskbar / Alt+Tab entry), optional click-through
• SetWindowDisplayAffinity(WDA_EXCLUDEFROMCAPTURE) for capture exclusion; optional DWMWA_CLOAK via settings (normally hides the window locally—off by default)
• Screen capture across monitors (mss) + Tesseract OCR + optional OpenCV preprocessing
• Local speech-to-text with faster-whisper; optional WASAPI loopback for system audio
• Claude Sonnet 4 with streaming replies and markdown-like rendering in the answer panel
• Global hotkeys via the keyboard library
• Settings stored in config/settings.toml (created on first save; file is gitignored)

Prerequisites

• Windows 10 (2004+) recommended for WDA_EXCLUDEFROMCAPTURE capture exclusion

• Python 3.11+

• Tesseract OCR installed and on PATH (or configure pytesseract to point at tesseract.exe)

  Install example (Chocolatey): choco install tesseract
  Or download the Windows installer from the UB Mannheim / GitHub Tesseract releases and add the install folder to PATH.

• Anthropic API key in .env as ANTHROPIC_API_KEY

Optional: faster GPU for Whisper

faster-whisper can use CUDA if you install a CUDA-enabled build of CTranslate2 and compatible drivers. The default configuration uses CPU int8 for broad compatibility.

Installation

git clone <your-fork-or-repo-url> GhostMind
cd GhostMind
python -m venv .venv
.venv\Scripts\activate
pip install -r requirements.txt
copy .env.example .env
# Edit .env — set ANTHROPIC_API_KEY

Fonts (optional)

For the intended look, place JetBrains Mono, Inter, or DM Sans under assets/fonts/ (.ttf / .otf). If they are missing, the UI falls back to Segoe UI / Consolas.

Window icon (optional)

If you add assets/icon.ico, GhostMind uses it as the window icon.

Run

python main.py

Usage

Action	Default hotkey
Toggle overlay visibility	Ctrl+Shift+G
Trigger screen OCR + AI	Ctrl+Shift+S
Clear answers	Ctrl+Shift+C
Switch Answers ↔ Subtitles tab	Ctrl+Shift+T

• Answers tab: shows streamed Claude output with copy per block.
• Subtitles tab: rolling transcript (Mic: / System:). Lines containing ? schedule a short debounce, then the recent transcript is sent to Claude as meeting context (the model decides whether to answer or summarize).

Use the green header dot to open settings (saved to config/settings.toml).

Configuration (config/settings.toml)

Created when you click Save in settings. Keys include:

Key	Meaning
monitor_id	mss monitor index (1 = first physical monitor)
scan_mode	manual or auto
auto_scan_interval_sec	Seconds between OCR runs when auto
opacity	Window opacity 0.5–1.0
click_through	If true, WS_EX_TRANSPARENT so clicks pass through
dwm_cloak	If true, applies DWMWA_CLOAK (usually hides the window locally—default false)
subtitles_enabled	Start Whisper listeners on launch
capture_mic	Capture microphone
capture_system	Capture WASAPI loopback when available
whisper_model	tiny / base / small / medium
loopback_device	Optional integer sounddevice index; null = auto-detect
hotkeys.*	Combo strings for the four actions

Hotkey strings follow the keyboard library format (e.g. ctrl+shift+g).

Troubleshooting

• TesseractNotFoundError / empty OCR
  Install Tesseract and ensure tesseract is on PATH, or set pytesseract.pytesseract.tesseract_cmd in code if you use a custom location.

• Invalid / missing API key
  Check .env and use Test in settings (or verify in the Anthropic console). The model id used is claude-sonnet-4-20250514.

• No microphone or loopback device
  Grant microphone permission on Windows. Loopback requires a WASAPI loopback-capable device; if none is found, only mic capture runs (see log messages).

• Global hotkeys not firing
  The keyboard library on Windows may need Run as administrator for low-level hooks in some environments.

• Window still visible in a specific recorder
  Capture exclusion depends on the app honoring WDA_EXCLUDEFROMCAPTURE. Some tools or GPU drivers may behave differently; there is no universal guarantee.

Architecture (ASCII)

+------------------------------------------------------------------+
|                          main.py                                 |
|  QApplication, settings load/save, SIGINT, GhostMindController   |
+----------+------------------------------+------------------------+
           |                              |
           v                              v
+----------------+              +------------------+
| HotkeyManager  |              |  AudioListener   |
| (keyboard lib) |              |  (QThread + STT) |
+--------+-------+              +---------+--------+
         |                                |
         | signals                          | subtitle_updated
         v                                v
+-------------------------------------------------------------+
|                     OverlayWindow (QMainWindow)              |
|  stealth.apply_stealth(hwnd) on show / move / resize         |
|  + Header (drag) + Tabs (Answers | Subtitles) + Settings   |
+-------+------------------------------------+---------------+
        |                                    |
        v                                    v
 +-------------+                     +---------------+
 | AnswerPanel |                     | SubtitleBar   |
 | + AI stream |                     | + formatter   |
 +------+------+                     +---------------+
        |
        v
 +-------------+     +------------------+
 | AiStream    |<--->| Anthropic API    |
 | Worker      |     | (streaming)      |
 +-------------+     +------------------+

 +------------------+       +-------------------+
 | ScreenScanWorker | ----> | mss + pytesseract |
 +------------------+       +-------------------+

Security & ethics

GhostMind is built for legitimate personal productivity (e.g. private assistance during your own calls or content). Bypassing exam proctoring, workplace policy, or consent rules is misuse. You are responsible for compliance with laws, contracts, and platform terms.

License

See LICENSE in the repository.