Air Traffic Controller
A profile-aware default browser router for macOS. It becomes your system default browser, then routes every link to the right browser — and the right profile — based on rules you define. Includes a Raycast-style launcher, multi-engine search, context-aware rules, and an optional AI agent for authoring rules in plain language.
Air Traffic Controller is a profile-aware default browser router for macOS. macOS lets you pick exactly one default browser; modern work is spread across several browsers and many profiles. ATC becomes the system default, then routes every link click to the right browser and the right profile — the destination most tools ignore.
What it does
- Routes by rule. Conditions match on URL host/path, source app, Wi-Fi network, time of day, Focus mode, and modifier keys; actions target a specific browser + profile, a fallback, or an interactive picker.
- Profile-aware launches. First-class Chromium and Firefox profiles, plus dedicated adapters for Arc Spaces, Safari, and Zen workspaces, with graceful fallback when a launch fails.
- Picker + launcher. A keyboard-driven picker for unmatched links and a global-hotkey launcher (⌥Space) for pinned URLs, recents, and search.
- Multi-engine search. Google, DuckDuckGo, Brave, Kagi, Perplexity, or custom engines, with per-engine destinations and
@keywordoverrides. - AutoPilot (optional AI). Describe a rule in plain language; the agent proposes a reviewable diff against your ruleset and applies it only on approval, using your own API key.
- Activity dashboard. See where clicks go and which rules fire — logging hosts only by default, with full-URL logging strictly opt-in.
How it's built
ATC is a native menu-bar app written in Swift and SwiftUI. It registers as the system default browser through the Launch Services / URL-handling APIs, decodes each incoming URL, and runs it through an ordered rules engine before dispatching to a browser-specific launch adapter. Browser support is tiered: Tier-1 covers Chromium and Firefox profile launching directly; Tier-2 adapters wrap browsers with bespoke profile and space models (Arc, Safari, Zen) behind feature-flagged experiments. The optional AI layer is a tool-using agent that operates strictly through validated, reviewable rule proposals — it never edits configuration directly.
Principles
Routing is local and fast — the browser opens before any bookkeeping, so clicks never feel slower than the system default. Privacy is the default posture: nothing about your browsing leaves the machine, and activity history can be scrubbed or cleared at any time. Air Traffic Controller is a closed-source native macOS app, distributed as a signed and notarized build.
Status
In active development; public beta on approach. The full routing stack — default-browser registration, rules engine, profile-aware launching, picker, launcher, search, context predicates, AI rule authoring, and the activity dashboard — is built and being hardened for release.
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