AppSound

A macOS menu-bar app that plays a sound of your choice whenever a selected application is launched.

Discord opening? discord.mp3 plays. VS Code launching? code.wav plays. Pick any .app, assign any .mp3 / .wav / .m4a / .aiff, and AppSound handles the rest in the background.

Download

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How it works

• AppSound listens to macOS's public NSWorkspace API for application launches (no injection, no Accessibility / Screen Recording permissions).
• Only real user-visible apps are matched (background "Helper" processes are filtered out by their activation policy).
• Each app has its own sound, volume, delay, and can be enabled/disabled.
• Sound files are copied into ~/Library/Application Support/AppSound/Sounds/ with a bundle-identifier prefix so two apps can use files with the same name without collisions.

Features

• Per-app launch sounds (assign / preview / change / remove)
• Volume and delay per app, plus global defaults
• Global master switch and "play only once per session" mode
• Menu-bar icon with quick access to all apps
• Launch AppSound at login (LaunchAgent)
• Dark / light theme (follows macOS)

Requirements

• macOS 13+ (Apple Silicon or Intel)
• Python 3.12+ (developed against 3.14)

Running from source

python3 -m venv .venv
source .venv/bin/activate
pip install -r requirements.txt
python main.py

Building the .app

# 1. Generate the app icon (resources/icons/appsound.icns)
python build_icon.py

# 2. Build the app bundle
pyinstaller AppSound.spec

# 3. (Optional) Ad-hoc sign to avoid a "broken package" warning
codesign --force --deep --sign - dist/AppSound.app

# Result: dist/AppSound.app

A note about Gatekeeper

This project is not notarized, so the first time you open the built app, macOS may warn that the developer cannot be verified. To open it:

1. Right-click AppSound.app in Finder
2. Choose Open
3. Click Open in the dialog

To remove the warning entirely for other users, you would need to sign with a Developer ID certificate and notarize via Apple's notary service (xcrun notarytool) — this requires an Apple Developer Program membership (US$99/year) and is out of scope for this project.

Configuration

Settings are stored in a simple JSON file (no database):

~/Library/Application Support/AppSound/config.json
~/Library/Application Support/AppSound/Sounds/

You can back these up or delete them to reset AppSound.

Security & privacy

• Uses only the public NSWorkspace launch API.
• Does not inject code into other apps, read their memory, or modify their files.
• Does not request Accessibility or Screen Recording permissions.
• Only plays the sound you assigned to an app that you added.