FreeThinker

Menu bar macOS app for generating concise AI provocations from selected text using on-device Apple Foundation Models. Think of it as your personal thought companion.

Beta — under active development

What it does

FreeThinker is a local-first AI thought companion. Select text anywhere on your Mac, press the global hotkey, and get AI-generated "provocations" that challenge and extend your thinking — all without sending a single byte off your machine.

Strenghten your thinking. Be a FreeThinker.

Features

• Completely local — AI runs on-device via Apple Foundation Models. No API keys, no cloud, no internet required after install.
• Private by design — all text input, customizations, and AI interactions stay on your Mac. Nothing is transmitted to external services.
• AI provocations — select text to get a short, thought-provoking AI response streamed in real time.
• Customizable provocation styles - Choose from contrarian, socratic, or systems thinking to interrogate selected text.
• Free software — GPLv3.

Requirements

• macOS 26+
• Apple Silicon
• Xcode 16.0+ to build from source

Getting Started

Clone & Resolve

git clone https://github.com/tannn/freethinker.git
cd freethinker
swift package resolve

Building

You can open Package.swift directly in Xcode, or generate the Xcode project via XcodeGen:

# Generate .xcodeproj from project.yml
xcodegen generate

To build from the command line:

swift build

Running Tests

# Via SwiftPM
swift test

# Via xcodebuild (if using .xcodeproj)
xcodebuild test -scheme FreeThinker

Development Setup

After cloning, install the git hooks:

bash scripts/setup-hooks.sh

This symlinks everything in git-hooks/ into .git/hooks/. It is idempotent — safe to re-run.

Commit Convention

All commits must follow Conventional Commits format:

<type>(<scope>): <description>

• type — one of: feat, fix, docs, chore, refactor, test, style, perf, ci
• scope — optional, lowercase alphanumeric (e.g. ui, model, deps)
• description — lowercase imperative phrase, no trailing period, max 72 chars on the subject line
• body — optional; must be separated from the subject by a blank line

Examples:

feat(ui): add dark mode toggle
fix: handle nil pointer in model loader
docs: update contributing guidelines
chore(deps): bump sparkle to 2.6.4

The commit-msg hook (installed by setup-hooks.sh) validates this format automatically.