Point at things on someone else's screen, over the internet — decoupled from whatever tool is sharing the screen.
You host a call, they share their screen, you see it in some third-party window. Arm a hotkey, move your mouse over that window, and a ghost cursor appears on their actual desktop with a short fading trail. No screen capture, no remote control, no input injection. It only draws.
macOS first, Windows next. Linux is out of scope — Wayland blocks global pointer position by design.
https://ghost-pointer-app.matewishkey.com — universal macOS build (Apple silicon + Intel).
It is not signed, so macOS blocks it on first launch and you allow it by hand, once, per machine. That page walks through it. Signing is a $99/yr Apple Developer account and only buys a clean double-click for someone else; it is not the App Store, and the store is closed to this app anyway (transparent overlay windows use an API Apple bans there).
| Piece | State |
|---|---|
relay/ — Cloudflare Worker + Durable Object |
Live. wss://ghost-pointer-relay.mergodon.workers.dev |
app/ — Tauri desktop app, macOS |
Works. v0.6.0, proven end to end. |
app/ — Windows |
Withdrawn. Built and published 31 Aug, locked up a real machine, pulled the same day. |
download/ — the download page |
Live. Built on the Mac, deployed from the Linux box. |
Proven, not assumed: a scripted host → the live relay → the app as guest → a ghost drawn on a real desktop at 22-24 ms, over other applications, with clicks still passing through the overlay to the app underneath.
In: host/guest roles, ten-character room codes, aim-rect calibration, display picker, ghost with a ~600 ms fading trail, interpolation, tap-to-arm and hold-to-point, instant local echo for the host, live latency, reconnect with backoff, click pulses, text marks the other side can copy, and settings in a file you can edit. A room holds one pointer and one viewer and refuses everyone else. Not yet: drawing/ink, marks that survive a rejoin, accounts, a tray icon, Windows, signing.
git clone git@github.com:matewishkey/mwk-ghost-pointer.git
cd mwk-ghost-pointer
git config pull.rebase true && git config rebase.autoStash true # keeps history linear
Then read CLAUDE.md — it carries the decisions, the directory ownership rules and the build
order. Run your editor/agent from the repo root, not from inside a subdirectory, so those
rules are in scope.
relay/ Cloudflare Worker, one Durable Object per room code (Linux box owns)
app/ Tauri desktop app — macOS AND Windows, one codebase (Mac owns)
download/ the public download page (Mac builds, Linux deploys)
tools/probe.mjs relay regression test — 13 checks, exits non-zero on failure
docs/spec.md wire protocol, coordinate mapping, MVP scope
docs/research.md concept validation, cost model, platform findings + what's unverified
cd relay && npm install
npm run dev # local on :8787
npm run deploy # to Cloudflare
node tools/probe.mjs ws://127.0.0.1:8787 # test local
node tools/probe.mjs wss://ghost-pointer-relay.mergodon.workers.dev
Last run against production: 13/13 checks passed. Round-trip figures move with the day and the
network — docs/spec.md carries the measured range and the conditions rather than one number.
cd app && npm install
npm run tauri build -- --target universal-apple-darwin
../download/build.sh # assembles the download site into download/public/
Needs Rust and node. The deploy runs from the Linux box, which holds the Cloudflare token:
wrangler pages deploy download/public --project-name ghost-pointer-app.
CLAUDE.md has the build order and what is deliberately left out. The open question is not
technical — it is whether pointing at someone else's screen feels good enough to keep. That
needs a real guest on a real call.