So, I like this tool a lot, but.. #338

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1. doggy8088 commented on Oct 10, 2026

   

   doggy8088

   on Oct 10, 2026

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   Hi there! 👋

   I (@doggy8088 / Will Huang) have stepped in to take over active maintenance of Carnac at doggy8088/carnac (project website: https://carnac.gh.miniasp.com/).

   Thank you for raising this concern regarding antivirus false positives and background processes / input responsiveness!

   Context & What Changed in doggy8088/carnac

   1. Why Antivirus Tools Flagged the Old Build:
      • Because Carnac is a keystroke visualizer, it uses the standard Windows SetWindowsHookEx(WH_KEYBOARD_LL) API to listen for key presses, which some heuristic antivirus scanners flag generically.
      • More importantly, the old 2.3.13 release used Squirrel.Windows (Setup.exe / Update.exe), whose self-extracting stub and background updater were frequently false-flagged by antivirus vendors as trojans/droppers.
   2. How We Fixed This in doggy8088/carnac (Retire Squirrel and add an opt-in update check doggy8088/carnac#57 & Add error logging and keep the key pipeline alive after failures doggy8088/carnac#56):
      • Removed Squirrel.Windows Completely: There is no longer any Update.exe or background Squirrel process (and Carnac never bundles or launches
        ode.js). We now ship a standard Inno Setup installer (CarnacSetup.exe) and a clean Portable .zip built transparently on GitHub Actions.
      • Non-Blocking Keyboard & Mouse Hooks: Hardened InterceptKeys and InterceptMouse so exceptions are caught immediately and CallNextHookEx always returns promptly without delaying keyboard or mouse input.

   Availability

   • Source Code: Available now on the dev branch of doggy8088/carnac.
   • Upcoming Release: This will be included in the next official release, which will be published to GitHub Releases (both installer and portable .zip), WinGet (winget install doggy8088.Carnac), and Chocolatey (choco install carnac).