Lock your keyboard so your cat can't interfere.
A lightweight Windows system-tray utility that instantly disables keyboard input
when your cat decides your keyboard is the best place to nap — so you don't come
back to 400 lines of jjjjkkkkkkaaaa and a closed document.
Cats love warm keyboards. A single paw-press can fire off shortcuts, rename files, send half-typed messages, or close your work. MeowProof lets you lock the keyboard in one click (or one keystroke) and unlock it with a shortcut your cat can't reproduce.
- One-click keyboard lock — blocks every key system-wide via a low-level hook
- Global unlock shortcut —
Ctrl + Shift + Llocks and unlocks from anywhere - Smart cat detection — auto-locks when it spots chaotic "paw-walking" typing
- Glassmorphism overlay — a full-screen blur tells you it's locked (per-monitor)
- Stealth Lock — lock silently with no overlay
- Sounds — optional sound on lock and on each blocked key (7 built-in + import your own)
- Prevent display sleep while locked, and auto-unlock on sleep or session lock — so you're never locked out
- Launch at login — self-healing registry entry even if you move the exe
- Warm "paper & terracotta" theme with a fully custom WPF tray menu
 Locked overlay — glassmorphism blur while the keyboard is locked |
 Tray menu — lock, toggles, and quick actions |
 Settings — startup, sleep, sound, and cat detection |
 Sound selector — 7 built-in sounds or import your own |
MeowProof ships as a single self-contained MeowProof.exe — no installer and
no .NET runtime required.
- Download
MeowProof.exe. - Put it anywhere (Desktop, a folder, wherever you like).
- Double-click it. It starts in the system tray.
To start it automatically with Windows, open Settings → Launch at Login (or the tray menu). It registers itself in your per-user startup — no admin rights needed — and repairs the path automatically if you move the exe later.
- Lock: click Lock Keyboard in the window or tray, or press
Ctrl + Shift + L. - Unlock: press
Ctrl + Shift + L(works even while everything else is blocked). - Stealth Lock: locks without showing the overlay.
- Cat detection: when enabled, MeowProof watches for cat-like typing and locks on its own, showing a tray notification.
Note: because Windows protects elevated windows, a non-administrator hook can't block keystrokes inside apps running as administrator (e.g. Task Manager).
MeowProof watches your keystrokes in the background without ever blocking them. It scores recent input across four signals — how fast keys are hit, how random they are, how many are held at once, and how long they stay pressed — and auto-locks when the pattern looks more like a paw than a person.
| Signal | Human | Cat |
|---|---|---|
| Time between keys | steady rhythm | rapid bursts, keys dragged across |
| Key variety | repeating, intentional | random — letters, numbers, symbols all at once |
| Keys held at once | 1–2 | 3–6 — a whole paw resting |
| Hold duration | short taps | long holds — sitting on a key |
It resets after 5 seconds of no input and never interferes with your own typing.
Requires the .NET 8 SDK.
# clone, then:
dotnet run # build and launch (Debug)Produce the single-file release build:
dotnet publish -c Release
# output: bin/Release/net8.0-windows/win-x64/publish/MeowProof.exe- C# 12 · .NET 8 · WPF for the UI, with WinForms
NotifyIconfor the tray - Low-level keyboard hook (
WH_KEYBOARD_LL) for blocking and detection RegisterHotKeyfor the global unlock shortcut- Windows acrylic compositor (
SetWindowCompositionAttribute) for the overlay blur - Settings persisted as JSON in
%AppData%\MeowProof\
Released under the MIT License.