Clicker v1.4.1 — live letters

Typing in the floating panel now lands on the Apple TV in real time, keystroke by keystroke, instead of on return. And since your Mac's text and the TV's text can drift out of sync, the new (x) button clears both at once.

Clicker v1.4 — type like you mean it

Typing on the Apple TV got a proper home: pressing the keyboard button now opens a floating, Spotlight-style entry panel — big text field, return sends to the TV, esc dismisses. It tells you when no text field is focused on the TV, and it works without opening the remote popover at all. This replaces the small in-popover field, which had unreliable focus.

Clicker v1.3.2 — cool and quiet

Fixes a serious energy bug: when an engine process died (reconnect, upgrade, connection retry), its pipe's readability handler was never unregistered, and macOS re-invokes handlers on closed pipes continuously — pegging a CPU core per dead engine. If your Clicker was warming the room, this is why. Also: polling now pauses entirely while the popover is closed, so idle Clicker does essentially nothing.

Clicker v1.3.1 — unstuck

Fixes a race where a failed connection attempt could permanently wedge the session even though a healthy connection was sitting right there. Failed connections now retry automatically every 20 seconds, and the error shows in the bottom card with a Reconnect Now button instead of covering the clickpad.

Clicker v1.3 — self-updating

Clicker now checks for updates automatically (at launch and every 12 hours). When one's available, a badge appears on the ··· menu — one click downloads the signed, notarized build, verifies its signature, and relaunches. There's also a manual Check for Updates item.

Brew users can keep using brew upgrade — both paths lead to the same bits.

Clicker v1.2.1 — command centre

Clicking power while the TV is awake now opens tvOS Control Center on the TV itself (like holding the TV button on the Siri Remote). Hold to sleep, click to wake while asleep — unchanged.

Clicker v1.2 — power etiquette

The power button now knows whether your Apple TV is awake. Click while awake for the power menu, hold to put it to sleep, click while asleep to wake it — and the icon dims while the TV sleeps.

Clicker v1.1.1 — no more hanging around

Fixes the connect hang: a leftover engine process from an unclean quit could hold the Apple TV session hostage, stalling every new connection. Clicker now cleans up its engine on quit, sweeps orphans before connecting, connects straight to the device's known address (with automatic full-scan fallback), and caps connection attempts at 12 seconds. Connecting is now ~1–2s.

Clicker v1.1 — batteries included

Clicker is now fully self-contained: the pyatv protocol engine (Python runtime included) ships inside the app. No pipx, no Homebrew Python, no setup — download, open, pair.

Changes

• Bundled, signed, notarized pyatv engine — the pipx install pyatv step is gone
• Buy Me a Coffee ☕ in the ··· menu, if Clicker ever saves your couch cushions
• Falls back to a system pyatv only for from-source builds

Install
brew install --cask ribren/tap/clicker — or download Clicker-macOS.zip below, unzip, drop in /Applications.

Requires macOS 14+ (Apple silicon). MIT licensed.

Clicker v1.0 — couch command

First release. A tiny macOS menu-bar remote for Apple TV.

Highlights

• Siri Remote layout: clickpad (with two-finger scroll navigation), back/TV/play-pause, volume rocker, power
• App launcher with real App Store artwork and type-to-search (net⏎ opens Netflix)
• Now-playing card with artwork, progress, and transport controls
• Auto-appearing text field when the TV shows a keyboard — type from your Mac
• Multiple Apple TVs, remembered pairings, auto-reconnect

Install

1. Download Clicker-macOS.zip below, unzip, drop Clicker.app in /Applications. Signed & notarized.
2. brew install pipx && pipx install pyatv (Clicker's protocol engine)
3. Launch, allow local network access, pick your Apple TV, enter the PIN.

Requires macOS 14+. MIT licensed. Built on pyatv, inspired by Itsytv.