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20 · Quick capture companion

A web page only sees the keyboard while its tab is focused, so the Hub alone cannot offer a global shortcut. apps/quick-capture is a small Tauri 2 app (system webview, tray icon, global shortcut) that does. It is separate from the main desktop app, which has no tray or global shortcut (DESKTOP).

The popup collects one sentence and posts it to POST /api/capture on loopback. hub-api (apps/hub-api/src/cowork/capture.ts) turns "remind Priya about the contract Friday" into a task; the shell does not parse anything.

Shortcut

macOS Windows and Linux
Global shortcut Command-Control-Shift-U Ctrl+Alt+Shift+U
In a focused Hub tab The same chord, and C when you are not typing The same

The chord lives in one file, packages/shared-types/src/capture-chord.json. The Hub builds its binding from it (packages/shared-types/src/shortcuts.ts) and the shell compiles it in (src-tauri/src/chord.rs), so changing the global chord means editing that file and rebuilding. Settings → Shortcuts changes only the in-tab binding. mod is Command on macOS (Modifiers::SUPER); Windows and Linux use Ctrl+Alt+Shift and never the Super/Windows key. Shortcut labels follow the webview's platform.

If the OS refuses the shortcut, the tray menu and the in-tab shortcut still work. On some Linux desktops a left-click on the tray icon does nothing; the menu (right-click) always has Quick capture and Quit.

How it is built

  • The same window, tray and shortcut APIs on macOS, Windows and Linux. The popup is a normal Tauri window (no NSPanel, no macos-private-api). On macOS the process uses the Accessory activation policy so it sits in the menu bar.
  • HTTP is sent from Rust with rustls; the token never enters the webview.
  • No osascript or other shell tools.
  • Config is capture.json in Tauri's app config folder: ~/Library/Application Support/com.ensemblework.capture (macOS), %APPDATA%\com.ensemblework.capture (Windows), $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/com.ensemblework.capture or ~/.config/com.ensemblework.capture (Linux). Mode 0600 on Unix; Windows keeps the user-profile ACL.
  • The Cargo version must equal root release.json; build.rs checks it.

Run it

Install a stable Rust toolchain and the Tauri system libraries (WebView2 on Windows, WebKitGTK 4.1 on Linux). Create a full personal token (ens_…) in Settings → Connections → Editors & agents; a read-only Connect key cannot create tasks.

cargo run --manifest-path apps/quick-capture/src-tauri/Cargo.toml -- --check   # prints this OS's chord, no window
export ENSEMBLE_TOKEN=ens_...
export ENSEMBLE_API=http://127.0.0.1:4000
cargo run --manifest-path apps/quick-capture/src-tauri/Cargo.toml

ENSEMBLE_TOKEN and ENSEMBLE_API override capture.json.

Look

The app icon, header and tray mark are the generated Woven Chorus / Satin Gold assets from pnpm brand:build (BRAND). The macOS tray uses a monochrome template; elsewhere the tray is gold on dark taskbars and ink on light ones. Saving uses a local 16 px indicator after 250 ms and prevents duplicate submission. Success and failure clear the delay and indicator immediately. Reduced motion keeps the status text and a still indicator.

Limits

  • No browser cookie; the personal token is the credential.
  • No microphone capture.
  • No writes to Google or Outlook.