cross-copy

Cross Copy is a network clipboard that works across Windows, macOS, and Linux. It lets someone copy a file, a folder, or a block of text on one computer and paste it on another computer on the same local network, with no cloud service, account, or remote storage involved in the transfer.

Setup starts with installing Cross Copy on every computer that should be able to send or receive. On Windows, a PowerShell command downloads and runs an installer that adds a command line tool called ccp to the user's path and sets the background service to start automatically at sign in. On macOS and Linux, a shell script installer does the same thing, preferring a tool called pipx when it is available and otherwise creating its own self contained environment. Both installers can also be skipped in favor of running from a cloned copy of the repository, and both offer a flag to skip starting the background service automatically.

Once installed on two or more computers, running ccp status confirms the local background service is active, and ccp devices lists any other computers that have been discovered on the network. From there, a basic transfer is just ccp copy on the sending computer and ccp paste on the receiving one, with support for copying whole folders, plain text through a --text flag, and piping data in and out like any other command line tool. A related command, ccp move, works the same way but deletes the source files once the receiving computer has successfully completed the paste.

Beyond the command line, Cross Copy adds right click menu actions in the file manager on each supported operating system, a small web interface reachable at a local address for dragging and dropping files, and a tray or menu bar widget for quick access. The project is upfront that it currently trusts anything on the local network, without pairing, authentication, or encryption, so it recommends using it only on networks the user trusts.