SnapAI

SnapAI

Fast macOS screenshot & screen-recording tool written in Rust, built for handing captures to AI agents (Claude Code, Cursor, etc.). Everything lands on the clipboard immediately; files are written to `~/Pictures/SnapAI` as well.

• Single binary: menu-bar daemon and CLI (Raycast / skhd / scripts).
• Screenshot → clipboard gets a PNG downscaled for AI (long edge 1568 px by default), so Cmd+V in Claude Code pastes the picture. Full-resolution PNG goes to disk and its path is printed on stdout (set clipboard.mode = "image+path" to also copy the path).
• Recording → H.264 MP4 on disk; clipboard gets the path and a keyframe contact sheet PNG (agents can't watch video, but they can read a grid of frames).
• Native ScreenCaptureKit, no Electron, no Swift runtime; capture-to-clipboard is typically well under 100 ms.

Build & install

cargo build --release            # target/release/snapai
scripts/bundle.sh --install      # SnapAI.app in /Applications + ~/.local/bin/snapai

First run asks for **Screen Recording** permission (System Settings → Privacy & Security). Run `scripts/make-signing-cert.sh` once first: it creates a self-signed "SnapAI Dev" certificate so the permission survives rebuilds (ad-hoc signatures change every build and macOS then forgets the grant), resets the stale permission entry, reinstalls the app and opens the Screen Recording pane. Toggle SnapAI on there, then **quit and reopen SnapAI**: macOS caches the answer per process, so a grant only takes effect after a relaunch.

If SnapAI shows as enabled in System Settings but still reports "permission denied", the toggle belongs to an older build's signature. Run the script above (or `tccutil reset ScreenCapture dev.snapai.app`, reinstall, re-grant, relaunch).

SnapAI uses the **native macOS screenshot shortcuts**. Hand them over once with

scripts/macos-shortcuts.