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Getting started

Install DevCatz and DBCatz, put your first site on https://, and open its database — about ten minutes.

DevCatz runs your projects on your Mac with their own names and HTTPS; DBCatz opens their databases. Each app works on its own; together they find each other. Both are free and open source, for macOS 13 or newer on Apple silicon and Intel (Windows is coming).

1. Install

  1. Download the app from the download page: it picks the right build for your Mac.
  2. Open the .dmg and drag the app into Applications. The builds are signed and notarized by Apple, so macOS opens them without warnings.
  3. Start it. DevCatz lives in the menu bar as well as in its window; closing the window keeps it running.

Prefer Homebrew? Homebrew loads a tap that is not its own only after you trust it, so the first time it is tap, trust, install; Homebrew picks the Apple silicon or Intel build, and the app still updates itself afterwards:

brew tap catzoidhub/catz && brew trust catzoidhub/catz
brew install --cask devcatz dbcatz dialcatz

There is no account and no licence key.

2. Add your first site

In DevCatz, on Projects, choose Create New Site and pick the project’s folder (or clone it from Git in the same dialog). DevCatz recognises the framework — Laravel, Next.js, Nuxt, Django, FastAPI, Go and many more — picks the runtime it needs and gives the site a name such as https://shop.localhost.

.localhost names work with no DNS setup. The first time, the browser warns that the certificate is not trusted: that is the next step.

3. Trust the local certificate (once)

DevCatz signs every site’s certificate with its own local certificate authority, DevCatz Local CA, which lives only on your Mac. To make browsers trust it, go to Settings → Project → Trust certificate authority…. macOS asks for your password or Touch ID, then every DevCatz site opens on https:// without warnings — cookies, OAuth callbacks and service workers behave as in production.

Firefox keeps its own list: import ca.crt (Settings shows where) or set security.enterprise_roots.enabled to true in about:config.

4. Optional: names without a port

Out of the box sites answer on ports 8443 (https) and 8180 (http): https://shop.localhost:8443. To drop the port, use Settings → Project → Enable clean URLs…. DevCatz explains what it installs, then asks for your password once. See what DevCatz changes on your Mac for exactly what that does and how to undo it.

5. Open the database in DBCatz

If the site uses a database that DevCatz runs (the Database section starts MySQL, PostgreSQL, Redis and more), install DBCatz the same way. It lists DevCatz’s databases on its own under DevCatz services — no host, port or password to copy. From DevCatz, Open in DBCatz jumps straight to the right database.

For any other database, choose New connection in DBCatz: by hand, over SSH, with AWS IAM, from Vault, or by pasting a URL like postgres://… (a whole DATABASE_URL= line from .env works too).

6. Optional: AI

AI is off in both apps until you turn it on, and every feature works without it. To use it, open Settings → AI, pick a provider (Claude by default; OpenAI, Gemini, Ollama for local models and more) and add your key. The key is kept in the macOS Keychain and shared by every Catzoid app, so you set it once.

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Last updated 2026-10-25

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