Hey everyone!
For the past few months, I've been building OpenCircle, a free and open-source Circle to Search app for Windows and Linux.
I really liked having Circle to Search on Android, but I wanted something similar on my desktop. Eventually, I decided to try building it myself.
I used Rust and iced for the app. The goal was to make something native that lets you select anything on your screen without having to constantly switch between applications.
Here's what I've implemented so far:
- Circle or select anything on your screen and search it.
- Extract text from images, games, and other applications.
- Ask AI questions about selected content, including with local models.
- Translate screen text in place, with live translation for games.
- Capture and annotate screenshots.
One of the more challenging parts was getting screen selection, floating overlays, and the different recognition and translation components to work together.
The app is still in its first release. I've tested it on Windows and Ubuntu, but users have already reported some performance issues on weaker hardware, so that's something I'm investigating.
I also used Claude to help with parts of the code. It's been useful during development, but there was still plenty of architecture, integration, debugging, and testing work involved.
The project is MIT-licensed, and I'd really appreciate feedback from other developers, especially anyone interested in Rust or desktop applications.
GitHub: https://github.com/AmerAlreyahi/OpenCircle
Demo: https://youtu.be/a7EmXrGpO3k
If you try it, let me know what breaks or what you'd improve!
Top comments (0)