# Show HN: Daisy – Local-first meeting recorder for Mac with an MCP server > Source: > Published: 2026-10-07 08:18:06+00:00 A Mac app that records your meetings and transcribes them on-device, with a local MCP server so Claude can read your calls. - **[Latest release on GitHub](https://github.com/ca33u/daisy-app/releases/latest)** or**[mydaisy.io](https://mydaisy.io)** — the same signed, notarized DMG. - Apple Silicon (M1 or later), macOS 14 Sonoma or later. Intel Macs are not supported: the DMG is a universal build, but Intel builds are untested. The Apple Intelligence summarizer and the Apple SpeechAnalyzer dictation engine need macOS 26. - Updates arrive in the app through Sparkle. - **Stays on the Mac:** audio, transcripts, summaries and speaker voice fingerprints, as plain files under`~/Library/Application Support/Daisy` (or a folder you pick). Transcription and speaker separation run on-device. No account, no telemetry, no analytics SDK. - **Leaves only after you turn it on:** transcript text, never audio, to the cloud summarizer you set up (Anthropic, OpenAI, Kimi or Cursor on your key, or your ChatGPT account); meeting titles and attendee names to Anthropic web search if you enable attendee research; a session you send to Notion, Linear, Slack, a webhook or another MCP server; session text, summaries, voice fingerprints and screenshots to your own iCloud if you turn on iPhone sync (audio never goes through the cloud); Google sign-in if you connect Google Calendar. - **Otherwise the network sees:** the update check and download from`mydaisy.io` , and the one-time download of the speech models you chose from`huggingface.co` (on macOS 26, Apple's speech engine fetches its language files from Apple). - **Check it yourself in ten minutes:** block Daisy in a firewall, set the summarizer to Apple Intelligence or a local model, record a meeting, and you still get a transcript and a summary. The steps and the hosts the app can reach are at[https://mydaisy.io/verify-local](https://mydaisy.io/verify-local) . Daisy runs an MCP server inside the app, so Claude Desktop, Claude Code, Cursor or Codex can search and read your meetings. 1. In Daisy, open **Settings → Connections → MCP server** and turn on**MCP server** . 2. Next to **Claude Desktop** , click the connect button. Daisy writes the entry into`claude_desktop_config.json` for you, access token included (Claude Desktop runs it through`npx` , so Node.js must be installed). Restart Claude Desktop. 3. Ask Claude something like *"What did we decide about the launch date in last week's calls?"* To add it by hand, put this into `~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json` (the token is on the same screen, under **Privacy → Access token → Copy**): ``` { "mcpServers": { "daisy": { "command": "npx", "args": [ "-y", "mcp-remote@0.1.38", "http://127.0.0.1:54321/sse", "--transport", "sse-only", "--allow-http", "--header", "Authorization: Bearer " ] } } } ``` `mcp-remote` bridges Claude Desktop's stdio to Daisy's local HTTP endpoint. Clients that speak HTTP themselves can use `http://127.0.0.1:54321/mcp` directly. Tools: | | Tools | What they do | |---|---|---| | **Read** | `list_sessions` ,`get_session` ,`search_sessions` ,`list_folders` ,`list_destinations` | Read your sessions, folders and configured destinations. | | **Edit, local** | `set_session_title` ,`rename_speaker` | Rename a session or name a speaker. Reversible: set the old title again, or pass an empty name to clear a speaker (a voice profile saved by the rename stays until you forget it in Settings). | | **Act, off by default** | `resummarize_session` ,`route_session_to_destination` ,`route_action_to_destination` | Regenerate a summary (replaces the stored one; uses your summarizer, which may be a cloud provider), or send a session or one next step to Notion, Linear, Slack, a webhook or another MCP server. Each send creates a new page, issue or message there. Enabled only after you turn on **Privacy → Allow actions from MCP clients** . | No tool can delete a session, audio or a transcript, or change Daisy's settings. How the server is fenced: - It binds to `127.0.0.1` only, so nothing outside your Mac can reach it, and it rejects requests whose`Host` or`Origin` is not local. - New setups require a bearer token kept in the Keychain, so other programs on your Mac can't read your transcripts without it. - The default port is `54321` ; you can change it under**Advanced** on the same screen. More: [https://mydaisy.io/docs/mcp](https://mydaisy.io/docs/mcp). Apache License 2.0. You can use, modify and redistribute the code, including commercially, as long as you keep the license and copyright notices. Full text in [`LICENSE`](https://github.com/ca33u/daisy-app/blob/main/LICENSE). Three capture modes, one app: - **Meetings** — records both sides of a call (your mic + the other side via system-audio loopback), no bot joining the meeting. On-device transcription + diarization (`Remote A` /`Remote B` , with optional mic-side attribution), a summary, action items, and a draft follow-up. Optional extras include periodic screenshots with on-device OCR, a preparation brief built from the agenda and past sessions, evidence-backed progress against the meeting plan, local meeting analytics, and custom meeting apps beyond the built-in list. - **Push-to-talk dictation** — hold a hotkey, speak, and the text is pasted at your cursor in any app. Three on-device engines: Whisper (default), Parakeet (FluidAudio) for lower latency, and Apple SpeechAnalyzer on macOS 26 (zero download). A custom-vocabulary dictionary fixes names/jargon, an optional voice profile learns your phrasing, and a rolling 24-hour history lets you re-copy. - **Voice notes** — quick one-off thoughts saved to your Library. Optional: import existing**Apple Voice Memos** as flat transcripts (on-device, opt-in, needs Full Disk Access). Around the edges: morning and end-of-day summaries on Home, an opt-in keyboard-layout auto-fixer (retypes text entered in the wrong layout, with undo and per-app exceptions), and provider-returned ChatGPT plan-window usage plus local token accounting for API providers. The UI is localized in English and Russian. The differentiator: Daisy ships a **local MCP server** bound to `127.0.0.1` that exposes your sessions as a queryable, actionable data source to any MCP client (Claude Desktop, Cursor, Codex). Because the transcript is already local, Daisy can be a local-only MCP source — something cloud meeting tools structurally can't offer. Requirements: - Xcode 26+ (ships the macOS 26 SDK the project builds against). The app itself runs on macOS 14+. - An active Apple Developer account if you want a signed local build (unsigned builds are fine for development inside Xcode) Clone and open: ``` git clone https://github.com/ca33u/daisy-app.git cd daisy-app open Daisy.xcodeproj ``` The Swift Package Manager dependencies (Sparkle, WhisperKit via [`argmax-oss-swift`](https://github.com/argmaxinc/argmax-oss-swift), FluidAudio) resolve on first project load. Hit Run; the app launches. ``` Daisy/ → SwiftUI app sources (PBXFileSystemSynchronizedRootGroup) DaisyTests/ → unit tests Benchmarks/ → reproducible WER/DER/JER scorer, product runner, and public evidence Daisy.xcodeproj/ → Xcode project scripts/ release.sh → end-to-end release: archive → notarize → DMG → sign → Sparkle appcast release-notes/ → per-version markdown bullets consumed by release.sh dmgbuild_settings.py → dmgbuild config (Python) for the installer DMG assets/ → DMG background, app icons build/ → archive output (gitignored) RELEASING.md → branch/channel model and the release/promote/hotfix flows ``` Key services that drive the app: - `CoreAudioMicRecorder` — CoreAudio mic capture with route-change recovery and the archive`.caf` writer (replaced the old AVAudioEngine tap to fix route-change/Bluetooth dropouts) - `SystemAudioCapture` /`ProcessTapAudioCapture` — the remote side of a meeting. The main path on macOS 14.4+ is a Core Audio process tap (the smaller "System Audio Recording Only" permission; it keeps working with Bluetooth output).`SCStream` loopback is the fallback: on older macOS, before the tap permission is granted or after it is refused, when the tap fails to start, or when it hears nothing that`SCStream` does. Silent-capture detection and warnings - `Transcriber` /`WhisperEngine` — WhisperKit on-device transcription with a Silero VAD pre-pass - `ParakeetEngine` /`AppleSpeechEngine` — the two alternative dictation engines: FluidAudio Parakeet-TDT (low latency) and Apple SpeechAnalyzer (macOS 26, no model download); Whisper is the default - Diarization + speaker memory — FluidAudio (Pyannote) labels remote voices; named speakers are remembered locally by a short voice fingerprint - `DictationPaste` — pastes dictated text at the cursor via the Accessibility API, restoring your prior clipboard - `RecordingSession` — orchestrates a session, owns calendar binding and auto-stop scheduling - `Summarizer` — multi-provider LLM dispatch: Apple Intelligence (on-device), ChatGPT account, Anthropic, OpenAI, Kimi (Moonshot), Cursor API key, Ollama, LM Studio (local), or an MCP summarizer - `SensitiveDataProtector` — optional on-device pseudonymization/redaction boundary for supported remote summaries - `MeetingPreparation` /`MeetingPlanAnalysis` /`MeetingAnalytics` — pre-meeting context, evidence-backed agenda progress, and local call metrics - `ScreenshotCapture` — opt-in periodic screenshots of the meeting window with Vision OCR; screen text flows into the transcript and summary - `PreMeetingBrief` /`MorningBrief` /`EndOfDaySummaries` — local briefs assembled from your calendar and past sessions, plus an evening digest - `VoiceProfile` — opt-in personalization learned from your dictations (and, optionally, your mic side of meetings) - `LayoutAutoFix` — opt-in keyboard-layout auto-correction via a CGEvent tap, with undo and per-app exceptions - `TokenLedger` — local token-usage accounting per cloud provider, shown on Home - `MCPServer` — the local MCP server on`127.0.0.1` ; exposes ten tools (five read, two local edits, three opt-in actions) to Claude Desktop / Cursor / Codex - `VoiceMemoScanner` /`VoiceMemoIngestor` — opt-in, on-device import of Apple Voice Memos to Markdown transcripts - Sparkle 2 — in-app auto-updates against `https://mydaisy.io/appcast.xml` [`Benchmarks/`](https://github.com/ca33u/daisy-app/blob/main/Benchmarks) contains the product-pipeline runner, a neutral standard-library scorer for WER/CER/DER/JER, fixtures, and published raw evidence. The first public baseline is AMI `ES2004a`: Daisy 1.0.7.59 detected 4/4 speakers with 15.68% DER and 20.28% JER at a median 0.122× real time across three warm runs on an M4 MacBook Air. It is one reproducible diarization case, not a general accuracy claim; Humla and OpenWhispr remain unscored until their raw output exists for the exact same audio. See the [methodology and publication gate](https://github.com/ca33u/daisy-app/blob/main/Benchmarks/README.md) and the [public evidence](https://github.com/ca33u/daisy-app/blob/main/Benchmarks/reports/public). ``` DAISY_AUTO_PUSH=1 ./scripts/release.sh [stable|beta] ``` Beta is the default channel from `main`; stable is promoted from a soaked beta with `./scripts/release.sh promote ` (no rebuild). Six steps: archive → export → notarize → DMG → publish to the [daisy-web](https://github.com/ca33u/daisy-web) repo → inject an `` into `appcast.xml` and commit. Vercel auto-deploys the site within a couple of minutes. Every stable version also becomes a [GitHub Release](https://github.com/ca33u/daisy-app/releases) with the same DMG (`./scripts/release.sh github-release `). Full branch/channel model and the hotfix flow are in [` RELEASING.md`](https://github.com/ca33u/daisy-app/blob/main/RELEASING.md). Release notes for each version go in `scripts/release-notes/.md` as a flat markdown bullet list (`- one line per change`). The script extracts those bullets and embeds them in the appcast `` so Sparkle shows them in its update sheet. - Chat with the community → [Discord](https://discord.gg/JYCZRZXy6j) - Questions, ideas, show-and-tell → [GitHub Discussions](https://github.com/ca33u/daisy-app/discussions) - Product issues, feature requests → file an issue on this repo or email **[support@mydaisy.io](mailto:support@mydaisy.io)** - Security disclosures → see [`SECURITY.md`](https://github.com/ca33u/daisy-app/blob/main/SECURITY.md) - Procurement / security review / tailored deployment → email **[hello@mydaisy.io](mailto:hello@mydaisy.io)** - End-user docs → [https://mydaisy.io/docs](https://mydaisy.io/docs) · Privacy →[https://mydaisy.io/privacy](https://mydaisy.io/privacy) - [Sparkle](https://sparkle-project.org) — in-app auto-updates - [WhisperKit](https://github.com/argmaxinc/argmax-oss-swift) by Argmax — Apple Silicon Whisper inference (part of the Argmax OSS SDK) - [FluidAudio](https://github.com/FluidInference/FluidAudio) — Parakeet ASR + speaker diarization - [FoundationModels](https://developer.apple.com/documentation/foundationmodels) — on-device summarization via Apple Intelligence (macOS 26+)