NetSwift for macOS

Native macOS SSH/Telnet terminal, code editor, and AI assistant — built for network engineers.

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NetSwift is a native macOS code editor and remote terminal built for network engineers. It combines the editing power of a modern code editor with a full-featured SSH/Telnet client designed to replace SecureCRT — plus deep AI integration throughout.

Written entirely in Swift and SwiftUI, NetSwift is unapologetically native macOS. No Electron. No sidecar processes. No compromises.

Status: Active development. Not yet recommended for production use.

Features

Remote Terminal

• SSH and Telnet connections with full VT100/VT220 terminal emulation
• Session Manager — folder-organized saved sessions with status indicators, drag-and-drop, bulk editing, and SecureCRT session import
• Authentication — password, SSH public key, and keyboard-interactive (TACACS+/RADIUS)
• Multiple simultaneous connections — each session opens as a native editor tab
• Session reconnect — disconnected tabs stay open with a one-click reconnect

Keyword Highlighting

• User-defined highlight rules — keyword or full regex (PCRE-compatible), per-rule foreground/background color, bold, underline
• Global and per-session rule sets — global sets apply everywhere, per-session sets layer on top
• Built-in starter sets — Cisco IOS, Juniper JunOS, Arista EOS
• Import/export — share rule sets with your team as JSON
• Live preview — see highlighting applied as you write the rule

Sanitization Layer

• Type-enforced secrets redaction — a structural guarantee that AI and session logs never receive unsanitized content, regardless of settings
• Default rules — redacts Cisco enable secrets, SNMP community strings, BGP passwords, RADIUS/TACACS+ keys, MD5 hashes, and private keys out of the box
• User-defined rules — add regex-based redaction rules with a live test field
• Reveal toggle — temporarily show raw content in the terminal display with an amber indicator and configurable auto-revert timer

Terminal Themes

• 16-color ANSI palette — fully configurable per theme
• Per-session theme assignment
• Built-in themes — Solarized Dark/Light, Nord, Dracula, One Dark, Material Dark, and more
• Import/export themes as JSON

AI Integration

• Copilot-style ghost text in the code editor and terminal input line — context-aware, debounced, uses a fast lightweight model
• Cmd+K explain panel — select terminal output, get an AI explanation, send suggested commands with one keystroke
• Proactive suggestions — AI triggers on local pattern matches (errors, interface state changes), not on continuous streaming
• Session-context-aware — AI understands what device you're on and what it just output
• Local ring buffer — terminal content stays local; AI is only called on explicit triggers, not continuously streamed
• Model tiering — configurable per surface (ghost text, explain, full analysis)

Code Editor

Everything from the CodeEdit foundation: syntax highlighting, code completion, project find and replace, snippets, integrated terminal, task running, debugging, git integration, extensions, and more.

Architecture

NetSwift is built on a unified TerminalConnection protocol — local shell, SSH, and Telnet are all the same interface. The pipeline is:

Raw bytes → ANSI Highlight Preprocessor → Sanitization Processor → Display Gate / AI Observer / Session Logger → Terminal View

The sanitization layer uses Swift's type system to make it impossible for the AI observer to receive unsanitized bytes — not a policy, a compile-time guarantee.

See the full design spec at docs/superpowers/specs/2026-06-07-remote-terminal-design.md.

Built On CodeEdit

NetSwift is a fork of CodeEdit, the open-source native macOS code editor built by the community. The entire editor foundation — syntax highlighting, file tree, source control integration, extensions, the terminal emulator, and more — comes from the CodeEdit project and its contributors.

We are grateful to the CodeEdit team and all contributors for building such a solid native macOS foundation to build on.

If you are looking for a general-purpose code editor, please check out the original CodeEdit project.

Requirements

• macOS 14.0 (Sonoma) or later
• Xcode 16+ (to build from source)

Building from Source

git clone https://github.com/netstacks/NetSwift.git
cd NetSwift
open CodeEdit.xcodeproj

Resolve Swift Package Manager dependencies in Xcode, then build and run.

Dependencies

Package	Purpose
SwiftTerm	Terminal emulator engine (custom fork)
swift-nio-ssh	SSH protocol
GRDB	Session persistence
CodeEditSourceEditor	Text editor engine
Sparkle	Auto-updates

License

NetSwift is available under the MIT License. See LICENSE.md for details.

As a fork, this project incorporates code from CodeEdit, also MIT licensed. All original CodeEdit copyrights are retained.

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Built on CodeEdit — the native macOS code editor built by the community.