Getting Started

Installation

Download the latest .dmg from GitHub Releases
Open the .dmg file
Drag Netfox to your Applications folder
Launch Netfox from Applications or Spotlight

First launch on macOS

Netfox is signed with Apple Developer ID and notarized by Apple, so Gatekeeper accepts it on first open. Just double-click — no right-click trick, no System Settings detour.

When you first launch any app downloaded from the internet, macOS shows a one-time confirmation dialog (“Netfox” is an app downloaded from the Internet. Are you sure you want to open it?). Click Open and you’re done — every subsequent launch is silent.

First-launch tour

When you open Netfox for the first time, the sidebar starts populating immediately:

This Mac appears first, pinned at the top, with the current Wi-Fi/Ethernet badge.
Within a few seconds, Bonjour services (HomePods, Apple TVs, AirPlay receivers, printers advertising mDNS) show up.
ARP-only devices (anything that has talked on the LAN recently — your phone, NAS, IoT plugs) come in shortly after.
The active-ping pass starts and gradually fills in IPv4 addresses for devices the system ARP cache holds but Bonjour didn’t reach.

On a typical home network you’ll see most of the picture within 30 seconds.

Allowing notifications

The first time Netfox detects a brand-new device, it tries to post a macOS notification banner. macOS will prompt you to grant notification permission — accept it once, and from then on every new-device alert pops up natively even when Netfox is in the background.

If you ever miss the prompt, an in-app banner reappears with a one-click link to System Settings → Notifications → Netfox where you can flip the toggle. The bell in the toolbar still works without notifications enabled.

Interface

Netfox has two main areas:

Sidebar (left)

Lists every device Netfox currently knows about, sorted with This Mac first, then online devices alphabetically, then offline. The search box filters by hostname, IP, or MAC.

The dot at the end of each row is green for online, gray for offline.

Detail panel (right)

Shows the selected device:

Identity — MAC address, kind (computer, mobile, speaker, tablet, TV, printer, router, …), vendor
Network — IPv4, IPv6, connection type (for this Mac only — see the FAQ for why we can’t tell for everyone else)
Activity — first seen, last seen, status
Recent activity — the last few transitions; click View Full History… for everything

The Probe button in the top-right of the detail header sends an ICMP ping to the device’s current IPv4 and refreshes its online state immediately, instead of waiting for the next discovery pass.

Tips

⌘R or the toolbar refresh button forces every discovery provider to emit immediately.
⌘⇧A opens Alert History — the persistent log of every new-device alert Netfox has ever raised.
The bell in the toolbar badges with the count of new alerts since you last opened the inbox. Tapping Done in the inbox clears the badge.