Live companion windows for Claude Code.
A native macOS app that renders independently managed windows — Activity, Tasks, and more — live from Claude Code's hook events. Your Claude Code client stays exactly as it is: no embedding, no patching. Just real native UI with live state, in its own window.
Free · macOS 15+ · Apple silicon · ad-hoc signed (Beta)
See it in action
A look at the companion windows — Activity, Tasks (white-on-black), and Responses — driven live from Claude Code's hook events, alongside your untouched terminal.
What you get
- Activity window — one row per tool call (running / done / failed) with expandable detail and colored diffs, grouped by subagent. Follows the tail as work streams in; scroll up to read back, then one click resumes.
- Tasks window — a live, white-on-black checklist that opens itself when tasks appear and highlights what just changed, with checkbox status icons.
- Per-session windows — split any session into its own Activity + Tasks pair to arrange several sessions side-by-side or stacked, then combine them back from any window. Jump straight to a window's paired Activity/Tasks window. Always-on-top and transparency are per window.
Your Claude Code client is never touched — no embedding, no patching. The companion only reads hook events.
Install
Easiest — paste one line into Terminal. It downloads the latest build, copies AltWindow to Applications, and launches it with no Gatekeeper dialog. On launch it offers to install the Claude Code hooks — accept to finish.
curl -fsSL https://github.com/dharmaje/AltWindow-releases/releases/download/latest/install.sh | sh
Why Terminal? AltWindow is ad-hoc signed, not notarized. On macOS 15 (Sequoia),
anything a browser downloads — an app or an installer — is quarantined and hits a dead-end
"Apple could not verify… is free of malware" dialog with no Open button. A
curl-fetched install isn't quarantined, so it skips that entirely.
Prefer the DMG?
Download it,
drag AltWindow to Applications, then clear the quarantine so it opens:
xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine /Applications/AltWindow.app
(or System Settings → Privacy & Security → Open Anyway). On Sequoia the old
right-click → Open no longer bypasses Gatekeeper for un-notarized apps.
Uninstall
Removes the Claude Code hooks (backing up your settings first), deletes AltWindow from Applications, and clears the event spool — one line:
curl -fsSL https://github.com/dharmaje/AltWindow-releases/releases/download/latest/uninstall.sh | shBuilds
- Latest — a rolling build, auto-updated on every change. Newest code; may be rough.
- Tagged releases (
vX.Y.Z) — stable, versioned builds, on the releases page.
Feedback
Bug reports and feature ideas are both very welcome. The bug form asks for your macOS version, AltWindow build, and steps to reproduce. See the reporting guide for tips.