CueTap

Typing you prepared in advance, replayed one keystroke at a time.

Install • Permissions • Usage • Configurations • Commands • AI agent

CueTap replays typing you prepared in advance, for live demos, talks, screencasts and teaching. Code, prose, commands, form fields, anything you can type.

You type at whatever rhythm your explanation takes and CueTap emits the prepared characters instead of yours. The typing looks real because it is real, but typos cannot happen.

It is one macOS command line tool with a menu bar icon. No window, no Dock icon, no recording, no network access.

Install

brew install CheyYuAn/cuetap/cuetap

Or grab the archive from Releases, then:

xattr -d com.apple.quarantine cuetap
sudo mv cuetap html-demo.json /usr/local/bin/

The xattr line clears the quarantine flag macOS puts on browser downloads. Homebrew downloads never carry it.

From source, with Xcode 27 or later:

git clone https://github.com/CheyYuAn/CueTap.git
cd CueTap && Skills/cuetap/scripts/build-local.sh "$PWD"

Permissions

CueTap intercepts and emits keyboard events, so macOS requires two grants in System Settings under Privacy & Security. Give them to whatever launches CueTap, Terminal included.

• Accessibility
• Input Monitoring

While a demo runs, CueTap forces the ABC/U.S. input source so an IME cannot rewrite what gets typed, and restores your own when it stops.

After an upgrade CueTap may start but ignore the hotkey. Ad-hoc signatures change with every build and macOS treats the new one as a different program, so grant both permissions again. cuetap doctor confirms it.

Usage

cuetap start

The icon appears in the menu bar and the bundled example loads. Open tests/test.html in an editor, put the cursor where the text belongs, press Command-Shift-R, and type anything.

One configuration can hold several segments, for text that belongs in different places. At the end of a segment CueTap keeps swallowing keystrokes while you navigate with the mouse, across files and applications. Command-click where the next segment starts and typing resumes there. After the last segment the keyboard stays locked for three seconds, absorbing keys pressed a beat too late, then the demo stops itself.

cuetap stop ends a demo, cuetap quit shuts the process down.

Configurations

A configuration lists the actions to emit, as literal text or a named key with an optional repeat count. The named keys are left, right, enter, tab and backspace.

{
  "version": 2,
  "name": "My Demo",
  "segments": [
    {
      "name": "Segment 1",
      "actions": [
        { "type": "text", "value": "<div></div>" },
        { "type": "key", "key": "left", "count": 7 },
        { "type": "text", "value": " class=\"body\"" }
      ]
    }
  ]
}

Drop a file into ~/Library/Application Support/CueTap/configurations/ and it appears in the menu, or import one from anywhere with cuetap load FILE. Imported files are copied, never modified.

You do not have to write actions by hand. Put the text you want to type in a file and compile it for your editor:

cuetap compile --profile vscode-c --output demo.json main.c

The compiler types every pair as both halves and a step back inside, writes tags as an empty element and fills the attributes in afterwards, leaves indentation to the editor and presses Tab or Backspace only where the editor's own rules would land somewhere else, and steps over closing braces and tags the editor has already placed. It replays the result through a model of the editor before writing anything, and reports the VS Code settings that would break the demo. Profiles are vscode-<language id> for every language VS Code defines, from vscode-c and vscode-python to vscode-vue and vscode-typescriptreact; their rules are built into the executable, so compiling works without VS Code installed, and an installed VS Code adds the languages its extensions define. plain is for anything typed outside a code editor, a terminal, a browser field or a notes app, where indentation has to be typed and nothing closes a bracket for you. Another editor takes --rules FILE with a file shaped like VS Code's language-configuration.json. After the demo, cuetap diff main.c typed.c reports the first character that differs.

CueTap emits exactly what the configuration says. It does not read your document, predict the cursor or fix indentation. It types the 95 printable ASCII characters plus Enter, Tab, Backspace and the arrow keys, and switches to the ABC input source while a demo runs, so text in other scripts is out of scope.

Indentation stays your editor's job and configurations count on it, so leave auto-indent on and spend a backspace action where a line moves back out one level. Turn off whatever types on your behalf: tag completion, bracket and quote completion, and Enter accepting a suggestion all insert characters the configuration is already sending. editor-setup.md lists the settings. Test a new configuration in the editor you will present with.

Full format: configuration.md.

Commands

cuetap --help lists everything, and every command takes --json.

Process control is start, stop, quit, status. Configurations are config list|use|rename|export|remove, plus load and reload. Building them is compile, profiles lists the languages it accepts, and checking a demo's output is diff. Shortcuts are hotkey and advance. Diagnostics are doctor and validate. Configurations and shortcuts change only while no demo is running.

With an AI agent

Skills/cuetap/ is an Agent Skill in the Claude Code layout. Copy that folder from this repository to ~/.claude/skills/cuetap (or your agent's skills directory), then hand the agent whatever you plan to type and it compiles, imports and selects the configuration for you. Starting the demo stays with you, at the keyboard, in front of the audience.

Privacy

No network connections, and keystrokes are never logged. ~/Library/Logs/CueTap/runtime.log records process events only.

License

MIT. The bundled editor rule files are Microsoft's and the Vue team's, under their own MIT licenses; see THIRD-PARTY-NOTICES.md.