Show HN: Cloakly – Hide sensitive windows from screen shares in real-time | Hacker News Reader

Show HN: Cloakly – Hide sensitive windows from screen shares in real-time

4 pointsjaygood2 comments

I’m a developer who spends half my day on screen shares. I got tired of the "pre-call ritual" of closing every private app just to make sure I didn't accidentally show a bank balance or a private message during a demo.

Existing "Focus" modes hide notifications, but they don't help if you need to share your full desktop for context.

I built Cloakly to solve this. It’s a Windows utility that lets you "cloak" specific windows. They stay fully visible and interactive for you, but they are 100% invisible to capture software (Zoom, Teams, Discord, etc.).

How it works (briefly): It leverages Windows OS properties to exclude specific window handles from capture streams. It allows you to keep your reference notes or private chats open on the same screen you are sharing.

Features: Dual Reality: You see the window; the audience sees your wallpaper/desktop. Ghost Mode: Adjust window transparency to see through to what’s underneath. Stealth: The app can hide its own taskbar presence.

I’m launching on Product Hunt today to see if this is a pain point for others or just me. I’d love your feedback on the implementation and whether you’d find this useful in your workflow.

PH Link: https://www.producthunt.com/products/cloakly Site: https://www.getcloakly.com/

Really clean approach to the pre-call panic. The dual reality concept is smart.

I've been working on a similar problem from the browser side (since most of my sensitive stuff lives in tabs - email, Slack, Notion). Different angle but same pain point.

Curious about the multi-monitor scenario - if I'm sharing Screen 1 but a cloaked window spans both monitors, does it cloak the whole window or just what's visible on the shared screen?

Also wondering about the "forgot to cloak" problem. I know I'd 100% forget to toggle before a call at least once a week. Any plans for persistent rules like "always cloak windows matching X pattern"? The mental overhead of remembering seems like it could be a blocker.

Congrats on shipping - the pain point is very real. Have you seen any performance hit on the capture stream itself? Some screen share tools get weird when windows are programmatically hidden.

Thanks for the feedback! Since the Favorites feature is already live in your settings, here is a punchy, brief reply without any dashes:

The Reply Thanks! The browser side approach is a great counterpart to this. Here is the technical breakdown:

Multi-Monitor Logic Since I target the Window ID via the Windows API, the cloak follows the window anywhere. It remains invisible to the capture buffer whether it is on Screen 1, Screen 2, or spanning both.

The Forgot to Toggle Problem I actually already solved this. There is a feature in the Settings now where you can favorite apps to be hidden by default. Once tagged, they cloak automatically the moment you launch them so there is no manual toggle needed.

Performance I built this natively in Rust using a specific flag at the compositor level to exclude windows from the capture stream. It is much lighter than real-time blurring and avoids the black box flickering issues common in other tools.

Appreciate the congrats. The pain point is definitely real!

Reply on news.ycombinator.com