Fleck

A native, local-first macOS notes workspace for quick capture, focused editing, on-device dictation, and explicitly granted local agent access.

Download & launch · Release notes & onboarding · Features · Build & test · Architecture · Testing · Contributing · Security

Download and launch Fleck

First public Developer Preview available. Fleck 1.1.2-beta.2 is published on GitHub Releases as a Pre-release Developer Preview. Read the release notes and first-launch onboarding before your first run — in-app onboarding is not packaged in this release, and the release notes teach the workspace, formatting, dictation, and agent setup in a few minutes. Local development candidates and GitHub Actions artifacts remain unsupported public installs.

Installing the app release

These steps use the published app ZIP on GitHub Releases — not the source code.

1. Open GitHub Releases and choose 1.1.2-beta.2 (or the newest preview). Every published build is a Pre-release Developer Preview until the first official release, and each preview is honest about its limitations.
2. Under that release's Assets, download the Fleck app ZIP for your Mac and its checksum file. Do not choose Source code (zip) or Source code (tar.gz); neither contains a ready-to-run app. Verify the ZIP against the release's SHA-256 checksum before opening it.
3. Double-click the ZIP in Finder to extract it, then drag Fleck <version> Build <number>.app into Applications, keeping its versioned name.
4. Open Applications and double-click that Fleck app. Follow the release's first-launch instructions. If macOS blocks it, check the release's signing and notarization notes rather than disabling Gatekeeper or removing quarantine protection.
5. Look for Fleck in the macOS menu bar and click its icon to open the workspace. Fleck is a menu-bar app, so do not rely on a Dock icon to find it.

A prebuilt app does not require Xcode, Swift, or Terminal build commands. Developers who want the newest source can instead get the source and build and test. Packaged development apps require the maintainer's private build registry; those commands are not an end-user installer.

Fleck is under active development. VERSION is the source-version authority; storage formats and contributor-facing interfaces may still change. See the release policy and binary-distribution checklist for the current release gates.

What is here

Illustration from a development build with synthetic notes and a synthetic file shortcut. Release-candidate screenshots from the accepted build replace this image before launch materials are finalized.

The ordinary build contains:

Area	Current implementation
Native workspace	Menu-bar workspace and an independently sized pinned window.
Notes and organization	Local notes, tabs, folders, search, backlinks, 30-day Trash, recovery, text/Markdown import, and plain-text/Markdown/RTF export.
File shortcuts	A native single-file chooser adds local file references; compact rows can open, reveal, relink, or remove them. Shortcuts stay on this Mac and are not included in note exports.
Native editor	An AppKit NSTextView editor with native undo, formatting, lists, checklists, and inline display of image files pasted or dropped from Finder.
On-device dictation	Apple on-device speech recognition, optional faithful local cleanup, and Inbox-safe Smart Capture routing.
Agent Connector	A separately packaged local helper with profile-scoped capabilities, explicit note or folder grants, visible activity, revision checks, and Undo.
Local persistence	Readable local storage with atomic replacement and a previous-generation recovery snapshot.

Inline image import accepts image file URLs, such as files copied or dragged from Finder; it does not import raw PNG or TIFF bitmap clipboard payloads. Fleck copies valid images of up to 100 MiB and 100 million pixels into its local image library, keeps the imported original bytes across editor undo and redo, and automatically fits the displayed image proportionally to the available editor width with a 320-point height cap. Notes, RTF state, exports, and agent text retain absolute local-file Markdown references, so image content is not a portable or self-contained export.

On macOS 26, Fleck can use Apple's on-device Foundation Models when the system reports them available. Failure or ambiguity falls back to the original text or Inbox rather than inventing a destination.

The Enhanced Local dependency graph is different. It is opt-in, debug-only experimental work behind FLECK_ENHANCED_CANDIDATE=1, with candidate Parakeet speech and Gemma cleanup/routing paths. It is not part of the ordinary release graph and is not approved for distribution.

See Implementation status for the short current roadmap and Architecture for the system boundaries.

Requirements

These are source-development requirements. For the published prebuilt app, use the macOS and architecture requirements listed on its release page instead (macOS 14 or later; validated on Apple silicon — native Intel and a full macOS 14 native pass are not yet verified).

Requirement	Version or scope
macOS	14 as the declared minimum deployment target.
Xcode	26 or later, with the full macOS 26 SDK selected.
Swift	6.

The deployment target is not a completed compatibility matrix. Current local validation is on Apple silicon; native Intel compatibility and a full macOS 14 native pass have not been verified. Source tests and offscreen component captures do not establish live-app or VoiceOver behavior.

The standalone Command Line Tools are not enough for this source tree. Check the active toolchain without building:

xcodebuild -version
xcrun --sdk macosx --show-sdk-version
swift --version

Get the source

Fork the repository on GitHub, then clone your fork:

git clone https://github.com/YOUR-USER/fleck.git
cd fleck
git remote add upstream https://github.com/exterminatorrat/fleck.git

If you only want to inspect or test the canonical source, clone the upstream URL directly instead.

Build and test

Run the ordinary Swift package tests from the repository root:

unset FLECK_ENHANCED_CANDIDATE
Scripts/run-nonempty-swift-tests.sh '^.+$'

The test runner does not launch the product Fleck.app, but its synthetic AppKit host may create fixture windows and change focus. Run native fixtures in a disposable macOS test account or session with synthetic content.

Maintainer handoff packaging requires a clean committed source tree and the project's private accepted-build registry. It builds the development-signed app bundle without launching it:

mkdir -p .build
RESULT_DIR="$(mktemp -d "$PWD/.build/development-result.XXXXXX")"
RESULT_FILE="$RESULT_DIR/build-result.json"
Scripts/build-fleck-app.sh --result-file "$RESULT_FILE"
FLECK_APP="$(Scripts/fleck-build-identity.py read-result \
  --repo "$PWD" \
  --result-file "$RESULT_FILE" \
  --flavor development)"
printf 'Built %s\n' "$FLECK_APP"

Interactive native testing is a separate, explicit step:

/usr/bin/open -n "$FLECK_APP"

Every packaging invocation allocates an immutable Fleck <version> Build <number> app name. A requested result file appears only after the app is published and verified, so consumers use that exact path instead of guessing a newest artifact or replacing an earlier build. Hosted CI uses the explicit ci-unverified mode for non-handoff packaging; contributors without the private registry must not bypass the local checks or describe a CI artifact as accepted.

Opening Fleck creates local Application Support data and may request macOS permissions. Use a disposable macOS test account and synthetic fixtures, never personal notes or recordings. The full commands and manual checks are in Testing.

Repository map

Path	Responsibility
Sources/FleckCore/	Local models, mutations, persistence, and recovery.
Sources/FleckAgentProtocol/	Typed local IPC protocol and framing.
Sources/FleckApp/	Native macOS UI, editor, dictation, and IPC service.
Sources/FleckAgentBridge/	MCP/CLI helper and Unix-socket client.
Sources/FleckModelEvaluation/	Deterministic local-model evaluation support.
Sources/FleckCaptureLab/	Developer capture tooling.
Tests/	Swift tests and privacy-safe fixtures.
Scripts/	Build, validation, audit, and profiling entry points.
Packages/	Enhanced candidate dependency package.

Project principles

Fleck keeps the frequent path small and native. Prefer Apple frameworks and the standard text system over embedded web views or replacement controls; avoid background services and dependencies without a demonstrated need; keep notes local by default; and preserve keyboard access, VoiceOver semantics, Reduce Motion, contrast, and resource efficiency as features evolve.

Contributing

Public issues and pull requests are open for ordinary bugs, feature proposals, and focused contributions. Start with Contributing, Testing, and the Code of Conduct.

Keep sensitive reports out of public issues and pull requests. Security vulnerabilities use the private route in Security; conduct reports go privately to Harry. The owner confirmed that a conduct test email and a private security-report notification were visible to their intended recipients. Those delivery checks do not promise a response or resolution timeline.

License and name

Fleck-owned source and documentation in the current tree are licensed under the Mozilla Public License 2.0, subject to the boundaries in NOTICE, Branding, and Third-party notices. Earlier revisions remain subject to the license notices and terms accompanying those revisions. No contributor license agreement is required. The Fleck name, logo, and other brand assets are reserved separately; the source license does not grant trademark rights.

Reviewed ordinary Swift code dependencies use MIT and/or Apache-2.0 terms; documentation and candidate assets may carry additional terms. Exact pins and attributions are recorded in the package lockfiles and ThirdPartyNotices.md.