Inlay
A desk you call up with a shortcut, in place of the Windows desktop.
I used the desktop as a workbench, but with many windows open, and even more with GlazeWM, it is always
covered. As a way to organise things it is also fragile: one level and no search. Inlay is a desk that comes
up with Alt+E over everything, with the files in a vault of real folders divided into spaces, search, undo
and the Mosaic of the whole vault.
Download
Download Inlay-win-Setup.exe from the latest release
and run it. The first time, Inlay asks for the vault: create a new one or use a folder you already have.
- Windows 11 with the .NET 10 Desktop Runtime; the installer downloads it if it is missing.
- Inlay installs for the current user, without administrator rights, in
%LOCALAPPDATA%\Inlay. It starts with
Windows and adds itself to the Send to menu of Explorer; both can be turned off in Settings.
- It updates itself from these releases: when a new version is ready, Update to X appears at the top, and
one click restarts Inlay into it; otherwise it installs when you quit.
- The installer is not signed, so Windows may warn about it: choose More info, then Run anyway.
- Uninstalling leaves the vault and your files where they are.
What it does
- Spaces and tiles: the spaces and the tiles on their board are real folders, so the vault stays tidy and
usable from Explorer even without the app. The files directly in a space are in its General tile.
- Works like the desktop: select, open, rename, drag, cut, copy and paste with the same gestures and
shortcuts as Explorer, also to and from other apps. Deleting always goes through the Recycle Bin, and
Ctrl+Z undoes moves, copies, renames and deletions, several times in a row.
- Search: type anywhere to search the whole vault, with filters by file type and by space, as buttons or
typed:
type:pdf, in:Work.
- Mosaic: the whole vault on a canvas you can zoom, with one zone for each space; the + next to the name
of a zone adds a tile to it.
- Move to… and Send to Inlay: files go to a tile or a space chosen by name, from Inlay or from the Send to
menu of Explorer.
- Claude in a folder: right-click a space, a tile or a folder, and Ask Claude about this folder opens
Claude Code there, in Windows Terminal, with a prompt you choose in Settings › Claude; Open Claude
here starts an empty chat. It needs Claude Code installed.
The complete guide, gesture by gesture, is in docs/uso.md, in Italian like the other documents;
the interface is in English.
Build from source
You need Windows 11 with the .NET 10 SDK.
dotnet build Inlay.slnx
dotnet test
.\scripts\New-DemoArchive.ps1 -Path D:\DemoVault
dotnet run --project src/Inlay.App -- --archive D:\DemoVault
--archive uses that vault for this run only. If an Inlay is already running, a second one passes it the
command and closes: quit the installed one first (Quit in its tray menu). --render-preview draws the
panel into an image without opening any window (docs/test.md).
How the code is built is in docs/; the idea, the rules of the vault and the plan of the
versions in PROGETTO.md. Built with C#, .NET 10 and WPF, on the Brace design system, with
Velopack for the installer and the updates.
License
MIT, including the files of the Brace design system in src/Inlay.App/Brace/.
