cargo build --release
git push origin main
Ctrl+C → captured & archived
AES-256 encrypted at rest
Encrypted locally · Instant search · Time travel
Cerulean design system · Sky + deep cobalt · Single-file drop-in
The mark is drawn from the C and P of copy / clip: the C and an open P share a single vertical stroke, forming a centrally symmetric figure. From its sky and deep cobalt grew Cerulean — a 62-token design system that runs through the app UI, the splash screen, this site and the live demo. ClipVault — the local-first clipboard history manager — is its first product.
FEATURES · Real workflows
Not a concept demo. From capture, search and organizing to whiteboard thinking and content diffing, everything is designed around what you actually do every day — copy, find, reuse, forward — and all of it ships today.
Sticky notes, shapes, connectors, freehand strokes and images mix on one free-form canvas: double-click to type, drag to resize, dock notes to the edge as anchors, with undo/redo and version rollback as a safety net — spread copied ideas straight into a diagram.
Put any two history entries side by side for a line-by-line diff: additions, deletions and changes in three-color highlight, line-level alignment with gap padding, and virtualized rendering that stays smooth on long text — see at a glance what changed between two copies.
Automatically captures and dedupes text, code, images and file paths, with pinning, favorites, tag-based organizing, rubber-band multi-select and a capacity cap.
FTS5 full-text indexing: phrases, types, tags, source app, time ranges and excluded keywords — pinpoint anything instantly, along any dimension.
Collect into multiple baskets with flexible ordering (added order or recency), file entries via right-click or in bulk, and see basket membership right on cards and in details.
Four views — timeline, calendar heatmap, statistics and playback — aggregated by day or month, with "restore to this moment" to recreate your clipboard at any point in time.
System / security / info categories with a three-state lifecycle (message → archived → cleared); failed unlocks, idle auto-lock, recycle-bin restores and more are logged automatically.
Common languages parsed and highlighted by pure-Rust syntect — copied snippets keep their syntax colors, indentation and context.
Master-password unlock, TOTP two-factor, Windows Hello biometrics and recovery codes; view / manage / export are isolated behind three permission tiers, gated per operation.
Four cleanup modes — by rule, by condition, by count, or clear all — with an automatic encrypted backup and recycle bin before anything is deleted; the data directory can be relocated wholesale, and import/export backs up before overwriting.
6 theme presets plus a custom 8-color editor, three fonts, three density levels and content zoom to mix freely — code highlighting switches along with the theme.
Pair devices on your LAN (Ed25519 fingerprints + invite codes); QR-code pickup puts PC content on your phone with a single scan — opt-in, and never through the cloud.
Export to JSON / CSV / Markdown filtered by type, tag, time or keyword; import with conflict strategies and preview, plus an automatic backup before overwriting.
A global hotkey summons a floating window (QuickPaste) to search and paste from history without switching to the main window; hotkeys are customizable, with filtering for sensitive apps.
PRIVACY FIRST · Local-first
Clipboard history, images and files are all written to a local encrypted database. No cloud connection by default, and no account required. Optional LAN sync is on the roadmap — and it will always be something you turn on yourself.
The database is fully encrypted with SQLCipher; images and files are stored chunk-encrypted with independent keys. Keys are derived from your passphrase and never written in plaintext.
View, manage and export are isolated behind three permission tiers, and you can layer on TOTP two-factor, Windows Hello biometrics, idle auto-lock and sensitive-app filtering to reduce accidental exposure and shoulder-surfing.
The Slint UI layer, the Rust core and the design system are all open source. The encryption paths and permission boundaries sit right there in the repository, so anyone can independently audit how it's implemented.
ARCHITECTURE · System architecture
From clipboard capture to encrypted storage, nothing ever leaves your machine. The Slint UI layer, the app orchestration layer, the core subsystems and the data layer each do one job well; LAN sync is a planned, opt-in outlet.
DESIGN SYSTEM · Design templates
A two-color system of sky and deep cobalt: from 62 design tokens to reusable .cv-* component primitives — fully open source, one cerulean.css file away.
The mark is drawn from the C and P of copy / clip: the C and an open P share a single vertical stroke, forming a centrally symmetric figure — rotate it 180° around its center and it maps exactly onto itself, so it sits naturally centered and balanced inside an icon. Favicon, top-bar mark, splash screen and social card all come from this single source.
Two foundation colors, same-hue derivatives and semantic colors — all exposed as CSS variables.
ACCENT · FOCUS
#4FB9D8
Sky
Soft · decoration · focus ring · chips · tints · icons
BUTTON · TEXT
#1775AD
Cobalt
Strong · primary CTA · emphasis text · links · active nav
Uniformly named grad-a through grad-soft, covering linear, radial and soft transitions.
Monospace display + system body + monospace code, with built-in CJK fallbacks.
Buttons / badges / inputs / keycaps, all driven by the same token set.
/* cerulean.css · token excerpt */
:root {
--sky: #4FB9D8; /* sky · accent */
--cobalt: #1775AD; /* cobalt · button */
--grad-a: linear-gradient(135deg, #4FB9D8, #1775AD);
--radius-md: 8px;
--elevation-4: 0 8px 24px -6px rgba(15, 46, 71, .15);
}
/* Components are just token combinations */
.cv-btn {
padding: 10px 18px;
border-radius: var(--radius-md);
background: var(--cobalt);
color: #fff;
}
.cv-btn--grad { background: var(--grad-a); }LIVE DEMO · Try it online
A 1:1 recreation of the real Slint app's three-pane shell: sidebar filters, type badges, search highlighting, the detail panel, light / dark themes and the CtrlK command palette all match the app. One click below starts it right here — everything is safe sample data.
MOTION · Motion details
These aren't screen recordings — they're the app's signature animations rebuilt in native CSS / SVG. Hover and click to feel the copy feedback, theme transition, card hover and whiteboard connectors for yourself — the same easing curves as the desktop app.
Hit "copy" — the card flashes a highlight ring and a "Copied" bubble floats up: exactly the feedback the app gives on capture.
cargo run -p clipvault-app
Copied
One click, and the whole semantic palette glides across — just like set_theme() taking effect instantly in the app.
Hover to lift, light up the border and fade in the actions — how every clip in the list feels.
The arrow between two whiteboard nodes "writes" itself along its path — hover to redraw.
ROADMAP · Development roadmap
ClipVault is in the final stretch of its Slint rebuild. Below is an honest status board — what has shipped, what's being polished, and what's still on the drawing board.
Clipboard capture and batch operations, collection baskets, four history views, the notification center, multi-factor auth with three-tier permission gating, the cleanup engine, data path migration, 6 theme presets plus a custom color editor, and import/export — all compiled and verified running.
Release-build memory profiling and size optimization, end-to-end Windows Hello verification, real-database regression for dangerous writes (cleanup / migration / recycle bin), and multi-device testing of P4 LAN sync and mobile pickup — being wrapped up item by item.
macOS and Linux compilation, platform-native menus and path handling are queued for the phase after the Windows build stabilizes — Slint already provides the cross-platform rendering foundation.
CREDITS · Open source & acknowledgements
ClipVault is built from these open-source projects, fonts and icons. Our thanks to the upstream authors — every license is preserved in full in the repository.
OPEN SOURCE · Collaboration
ClipVault keeps its user docs, build instructions, security policy and design templates in one repository — easy for users to learn from, and easy for contributors to join.
Quick start, user guide, custom data paths and migration notes — so users can find answers all the way from installation to daily use.
Architecture notes, API reference, data layout, the permission model and a contributing guide — a project you can read and collaborate on, not just run.
Build guides, signing notes and release packages, covering the critical path from local development to a desktop installer.
The security policy, permission boundaries, encrypted storage and sensitive-app filtering are maintained as a standing priority — a clipboard tool must never become a privacy risk.
The Cerulean UI demos keep the tokens, component experiments and page templates — documenting the design process and ready to reuse in future projects.
LINKS · Friends of the project
The open-source ecosystem ClipVault builds on — and link exchanges are welcome.