karabiner / local OCR capture

A screen region becomes usable text.

OCR takes an interactive screenshot, waits for the file to settle, reads it locally with Tesseract, saves the extracted text beside the image, and puts that text on the clipboard.

Run the scan replay Inspect the pipeline

ocr / capture chamber simulation ready

deterministic simulation

This page uses a fixed synthetic document. It cannot see your screen, files, or clipboard.

synthetic capturefield-note.png

FIELD NOTE / INTERFACE STUDY Observed state: ready for review Queue depth: 03 items Receipt: local record retained

recognized textTesseract / local

FIELD NOTE / INTERFACE STUDY
Observed state: ready for review
Queue depth: 03 items
Receipt: local record retained

simulation.ready / synthetic source / no machine access

capture → settle → recognize → deliver

The output has a visible path.

The shortcut is a small pipeline rather than a black box. Each stage produces evidence the next stage can use, and cancellation stops before OCR or clipboard work begins.

01 / capture

Select the exact region

macOS opens its interactive screenshot cursor and writes a timestamped PNG under ~/pictures/screenshots/.

02 / settle

Wait for the file

A bounded file-existence loop protects the recognizer from the race where screenshot capture returns before the image is fully available.

03 / recognize

Read locally

Tesseract runs in uniform-block mode with OEM 1 at 144 DPI. No image or extracted text is sent to a remote OCR service.

04 / deliver

Save and copy

The recognized text is written to a timestamp-matched sidecar and copied as plain text. The debug log records the clipboard character count.

local data / separate artifacts

Keep the source and the reading.

Image and text remain independently useful. The capture can be reviewed later, the sidecar can be searched, and the clipboard result is ready for the next immediate action.

image artifact

Timestamped PNG

The original selected region remains under the screenshots directory instead of disappearing after recognition.

text artifact

Matched sidecar

Recognized text is saved under the screenshots txt/ directory with the same timestamp as its source image.

immediate handoff

Clipboard text

The clipboard receives text—not the PNG. The sibling Screenshot Clipboard tool exists for the image-first route.

one shortcut / one local engine

Text is one gesture away.

The repository registers OCR as a macOS Karabiner tool. The suggested binding is Left Shift + 4, though the script can be invoked directly or bound to another trigger.

install

Fetch only OCR

$./install.sh ocr

The private-repository installer uses a sparse checkout and exposes the screenshot-ocr command locally.

dependency

Tesseract

$brew install tesseract

Recognition stays on the Mac. Karabiner’s minimal environment is handled by adding the standard Homebrew paths inside the script.

suggested trigger

Left Shift + 4

One key gesture opens the region selector. Cancelling the selector produces no image, text sidecar, or clipboard mutation.

execution boundary

macOS / local

The real script reads the selected screen region and clipboard only when invoked on the Mac. This webpage does neither.

Request repository access Next tool: Screenshot Clipboard