Platform notes

Voltip is the same app on every desktop system. This page lists what differs between them.

Windows

• Versions: Windows 10 and 11, x64.
• Packages: a per-user installer that needs no administrator rights, or a portable zip.
• SmartScreen: the packages are not code-signed yet, so SmartScreen warns on the first start. Choose More info, then Run anyway.
• Windows that run as administrator: Windows does not let an ordinary app type into them. Voltip notices this before pasting and leaves the text on the clipboard instead.
• Secure desktop: the sign-in screen and elevation prompts refuse typed input from apps.
• Voice edit copies the selection with Ctrl Insert. On keyboard layouts where AltGr types characters, Ctrl Alt E can clash with AltGr+E; choose another shortcut there.
• Tray: left-click opens Voltip, right-click opens the menu. Closing the window keeps Voltip running in the tray.
• GPU: Vulkan, with the graphics driver's Vulkan support. The Vulkan loader ships with Voltip.

macOS

• Versions: macOS 11 or later, as one package for Apple silicon and one for Intel.
• First start: the app is signed with the project's own certificate but is not notarized by Apple. See Install for opening it the first time.
• Permissions: the microphone, and Accessibility, which Voltip needs to paste and to use a single key as the trigger. Voltip does not need Input Monitoring. From version 0.0.7 on, releases share one signing certificate so that updates keep the permissions; the first such update has not been checked on a real Mac yet.
• Fn as the trigger: set When pressing the 🌐 key to Do Nothing under System Settings → Keyboard.
• Scenes recognise the app but not the window title.
• Tray: clicking the menu bar icon opens the menu. Closing the window keeps Voltip running; it can be reopened from the Dock or the menu bar.
• GPU: Metal.

Linux

• Packages: .deb and AppImage, for x64. They are built on Ubuntu 22.04 and need glibc 2.34 or newer.
• Sessions: X11 and Wayland. Closing the window quits Voltip, because there is no tray icon on Linux.
• GPU: Vulkan, with a driver that supports it (libvulkan1).

Pasting

On X11, pasting works without further setup; the .deb recommends xdotool as a fallback. On Wayland, Voltip needs a helper tool that can press keys, and it tries them in this order:

Desktop	Tools
KDE Plasma	wtype, dotool, ydotool, kwtype
GNOME	dotool, ydotool
Sway, Hyprland and other wlroots desktops	wtype, dotool, ydotool

Install one of them from your distribution. dotool and ydotool need access to /dev/uinput; see their documentation. Without a tool, the text stays on the clipboard.

Pure Wayland sessions

A Wayland session without X11 support places some limits on all apps:

• No global shortcut and no single-key trigger. Bind system shortcuts to voltip-desktop --toggle, --edit-toggle and --cancel instead; see Shortcuts and recording modes.
• Esc does not cancel; use the --cancel shortcut.
• The app in front cannot be detected, so scenes do not apply.

In a session that runs X11 apps through XWayland, the shortcut works only while an X11 window has the focus.

Android

The Android app, which turns a phone into a microphone and keyboard for the computer, is in development and not released yet. See the phone page.

Not available

• iOS has not been started.
• Packages for Windows on ARM and Linux on ARM are not planned for now.