No state history
A snapshot can’t tell you a process was healthy yesterday and is a zombie today. Talox keeps the before and after.
Public beta · macOS 14+
Every process.
Every state.
Accounted for.
Talox is the automaton that watches every process on your Mac — what it is, who owns it, what state it’s in, and what changed. Then it lets you do something about it.
0process data uploaded
~0.3%collector CPU
14 daysof process history
6 rulesfor anomalous states
WHY A SNAPSHOT ISN’T ENOUGH
Activity Monitor shows a snapshot.
Talox keeps the record.
A process isn’t just a number. It has an owner, a start time, a state, and a history. When something changes, you need the before and after — not just right now.
No ownership
A PID doesn’t say which app, login item or launchd job owns it — or whether it’s an orphan. Talox resolves the owner and shows the evidence.
No control
Seeing a problem isn’t managing it. Stop it, restart it, or leave it alone — with confirmation and a record of what happened.
WHAT TALOX DOES
The process state manager for macOS.
A live roster, state history, ownership evidence and control — plus the disk each app owns and what the tool itself costs.
01 · THE ROSTER
Every process, every state.
Talox groups processes by owner and shows state, footprint, CPU, uptime and the evidence behind each attribution — with one verdict on the whole machine.
- footprint, not RSS
- PID + start time is the identity
- every attribution carries its evidence
02 · HISTORY
See what changed, not just what’s now.
Per-instance growth over 1–30 days. A restart creates a new instance, so a leak can’t hide behind a recycled PID.
- growth per process instance
- a rate per day once there’s enough data
- drill into one instance’s memory curve
03 · ANOMALIES
States that shouldn’t exist.
Orphans whose parent died, duplicate instances, dev servers idle for hours, memory hogs, zombies, and a WindowServer that never stops drawing.
- six rules, each with its evidence
- stop one process or the whole group
- critical system processes are refused, not force-killed
04 · TIMELINE
Put state changes on a calendar.
Software installs, updates, removals and memory-pressure episodes share one axis. The day something changed sits next to the day it showed up.
- software changes and pressure, side by side
- each episode lists its largest processes
- 30 days of system history
05 · DISK
What each app owns on disk.
Bundle, containers, Application Support and caches, counted by allocated size. Residual data gets advice — never an automatic delete.
- allocated size, not logical size
- safe / check first / keep, with a reason
- commands you can review and run yourself
06 · SELF-COST
Light enough to leave running.
A menu bar app with no Dock icon. The collector samples every 60 seconds; the panel refreshes every 2 seconds only while it’s open.
- collector ~0.3% CPU, about 7 MB
- panel under 100 MB while open
- one local SQLite file
LOCAL BY DESIGN
It watches processes.
We don’t.
No account. No process data leaves the Mac. Talox writes to a single SQLite file you can open yourself; anonymous install counts and crash reports are optional.
- Process names, PIDs, states, memory and CPU
- Owners, start times and attribution evidence
- Nothing leaves the machine
~0.3%collector CPU
~170 msCPU per minute
0process data uploaded
System processes owned by other users can’t be read without root. Talox fills them in with ps/top and marks the estimate as ≈ or ~.
PRICING
Free while it’s in beta.
At 1.0 there will be a one-time license — no subscription, no account. Beta testers keep a launch discount.
- No account, no card, no trial timer
- Every feature is available in the beta
- Your data stays local after the license too
Talox Beta
Everything, while we finish 1.0.
$0
- All features, no limits
- 14 days of detail · 30 days of timeline
- English and 简体中文
- Updates during the beta
No card. No sign-up form. Just email and we’ll send the build.
What exactly does Talox manage?
Process states. Talox observes every process, records its footprint and CPU over time, resolves who owns it, flags anomalous states (orphan, duplicate, idle, zombie) and lets you stop or restart processes you own.
How is this different from Activity Monitor?
Activity Monitor is a live snapshot. Talox keeps the record: per-instance history, ownership evidence, state changes and control. You can see what a process was doing before it became a problem.
Does it only monitor memory?
No. Talox manages process states — running, idle, orphaned, duplicated, zombie — plus ownership, CPU, history, control and disk. Memory pressure is one signal among several.
Why footprint instead of RSS?
phys_footprint is the number Activity Monitor shows and the number the system actually accounts for. RSS double-counts shared memory and drifts from reality, so Talox only falls back to RSS for processes it cannot read.
Does it send any data anywhere?
Only anonymous install counts and optional crash reports: a random install ID, app version, macOS version, and — if enabled — a crash stack trace. No process names, paths, window titles or disk contents. Turn both off in Settings.
Does it need root or special permissions?
No. It runs entirely as your user. Processes owned by other users, such as WindowServer and launchd, cannot be read without root; Talox fills those in with ps/top and labels the estimate.
Why does it install a background collector?
State history needs a process that keeps sampling when the window is closed. The collector is a login item, samples once a minute, and can be stopped at any time in Settings. The app keeps working with the collector off, just without new history.
Can it quit apps for me?
It can stop processes owned by your user, one at a time or as a group, after a confirmation. Critical system processes are refused. It never kills anything automatically.
Will it delete files to free up disk space?
No. The disk tab gives advice and a suggested command; deleting is always your decision. Containers and unknown folders are marked “check first”, never “safe”.
Which Macs are supported?
macOS 14 or later, on Apple silicon and Intel. It is a menu bar app with no Dock icon.
Is it on the Mac App Store?
No. The App Sandbox blocks the process APIs Talox depends on — footprint, signals, ps/top and other apps’ containers. It will be distributed directly as a notarized app.
Is it open source?
Not yet. The core is a small Swift codebase with no third-party dependencies; we’re deciding how much to publish. The privacy claims are verifiable: process data is only written to a plain SQLite file, and the only network client is the optional anonymous heartbeat/crash reporter.
PUBLIC BETA
Every process.
Accounted for.
Talox is in public beta. The notarized 1.0 build is next; beta invites go out first, and beta testers keep a launch discount.