Then the work drifted into a dozen tabs, three logins and however many dashboards decided to redesign themselves this quarter. The setup stopped feeling like a system and started feeling like a pile.
A note from the person who runs RoachWares
You weren't crazy. The cloud got loud.
It happened to me too. Sitting down at a laptop used to mean hours of code, writing and research, not debugging the setup, chasing logins or nursing along some “smart” cloud tool that kept trying to help by getting in the way.
For the work that actually matters, the wish list was short:
tools that live on your own Macs, stay where you put them, and keep working when the internet doesn't.
So I built RoachNet.
RoachNet 1.1.4 for Mac
What RoachNet is
RoachNet is a native Mac app for local AI, archiving and development, and it actually lives on your Mac.
Your models, notes, maps and code sit in one folder on your own disk. Nothing in there vanishes because a login expired or a product manager got bored.
Where did that file go? ~/RoachNet. It's always ~/RoachNet.
What you can do with it
Three jobs, all of them on your own Mac, and all of them still work with the Wi-Fi off.
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Local AI
Real models on your Mac's own GPU, with no API key and no asking anyone's permission.
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Your own archive
Park the pages, docs, playlists and projects you care about somewhere they'll still be in five years.
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A place to build
The same setup on your desktop, your laptop and that machine in the closet. No browser required.
And no “we've updated our terms” emails standing between you and your work.
Who it's for
People who like owning the tools they lean on: developers, archivists, media people and anyone who'd rather their files stayed put.
- Keep your favourite tools close instead of chasing the next dashboard.
- Treat the internet as a bonus round, not a requirement.
- Build the kind of setup nobody else can switch off from a control panel.
Plenty of them still use cloud services on top, and that's fine. RoachNet just makes sure the important stuff doesn't depend on the cloud.
Seven promises
What RoachNet promises
Seven promises about how RoachNet is built. You can check every one of them on your own Mac.
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Your data stays in your custody
Your files, models, chats and settings live on your Mac, in folders you can open in Finder, back up or move. RoachNet collects no analytics. It goes online to fetch what you ask for, and to check GitHub for its own updates.
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Local first, offline first
Downloaded models, the Vault, offline maps, saved archives and Dev Studio keep working with no internet at all. The network is for downloads and for the features you switch on.
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AI that works for you
Models run on your Mac's own GPU with RoachNet's engine, and agents in your Org work under the rules and approvals you set. A Claude or ChatGPT plan is an option you add with your own account, never a requirement.
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Private by design
What leaves your Mac is opt-in and labeled: a RoachNet account, web chat, or RoachTail between your own devices. The RoachNet API asks anything other than RoachNet for a token, and its local servers refuse requests from web pages.
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Plays well with others
The model server speaks the Ollama, OpenAI and Anthropic APIs, so the tools you already use can point at it. Your files stay ordinary files: Markdown, PDFs, GGUF models, ZIM archives.
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Built to be extended
Feature packs add what you need and leave out what you don't. Bring your own themes and agents, and build on the documented API.
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Your hardware, your call
RoachNet runs on the Mac you have. With RoachNet Cluster, new in 1.1, your other Macs can share a model too big for one, over your own network, paired with a code only you hold. The 1.1.0 release was tested with two runtimes on one Mac.
If RoachNet ever falls short of one of these, that's a bug. Tell us.
Bring the important stuff home.
⇧
⌘
R
Press ⇧⌘R to download RoachNet 1.1.4 for your Mac.
You'll land on Home right after, and the download starts there.
RoachNet 1.1.4 is ad-hoc signed and not Apple-notarized, so macOS asks you to approve it once. Apple Silicon, macOS 14 or later, 240 MB.