Hyoi
A magical shelf that appears when you drag files on Mac
232 followers
A magical shelf that appears when you drag files on Mac
232 followers
Hyoi is a lightweight macOS utility that automatically shows a floating shelf when you drag files. Drop files, images, or text temporarily, then drag them anywhere. Perfect for multi-step file operations without cluttering your desktop.
Hyoi
Hey Product Hunt! 👋
I built Hyoi to solve a simple but annoying problem: moving files between apps on macOS.
I often found myself dragging a file, realizing I needed to open another app first, then having to start over. I wanted a "temporary pocket" that appears exactly when I need it.
The name "Hyoi" (ひょい) is a Japanese onomatopoeia for effortlessly picking something up - which is exactly what this app lets you do.
Technical notes:
- Built with Swift & SwiftUI
- Uses Input Monitoring to detect file drags
- No network access - everything stays local
I love that it's a lightweight utility because I hate apps that hog my Mac's memory. I wonder if it’s easy to clear the shelf once I'm done, and if it supports dragging text snippets from a browser just as smoothly as it handles images and files.
Hyoi
@theaxx Thanks! You can clear the entire shelf with a single button.
Drag-and-drop for text snippets is supported as well, and a small bug fix is currently under review to make it fully smooth.
How do you handle multiple file types or large batches on the shelf? Are there limits to what the shelf can hold and how do you make sure it doesn’t interfere with other drag-and-drop workflows?
Hyoi
@anders_dahl2 Basically, the shelf only keeps file paths, so it doesn’t consume much memory and there are no hard limits on what it can hold.
Even in situations where the shelf isn’t really needed, it may still appear during file or text drag-and-drop, but if you don’t drop anything onto it, it closes almost immediately.
Exquisite, useful Mac app. I have been using it for 24 hours. Indispensable, already. Question: Are you able to allow one to save sets of files in the app? So that they are available in the future? Contents of the app seem to disappear wbhen I restart my Mac. Thank you.
Hyoi
@possomcohen Thanks for using it! It was meant to be temporary, so I didn’t support saving at first. Since saving is possible, I’ll roll it out in an update soon.
I love this concept! One thing is if the list gets too long, will there be a bulk edit to remove/search the files?
Hyoi
@nick36_wu Thanks! There’s a bulk delete button on the shelf. Search isn’t supported for now.
@yu_kikimura Hi, seems really useful, I saw similar ones built into phones. Is this utility collapsible? Can it hold pure text too?
Hyoi
@arnost_havelka Thanks for the comment!
At the moment, it isn’t collapsible. If no file is placed, it will auto-close, but when a file is placed, you can close it using a button or a keyboard shortcut.
It can also hold pure text 🙂
Hyoi
@mhamdouchi Thanks for the thoughtful feedback!