This new Mac app locks the keyboard to prevent chaos when your cat tramples all over it
A new Mac app called Cats Lock has been released to help users prevent accidental keyboard inputs caused by cats. The app allows users to quickly lock their keyboard with a click or shortcut, and includes deterrent sounds. It was developed by indie developer Todd Alexander and is compatible with macOS 14.0 and later.
- ▪Cats Lock is a $3 app designed to prevent accidental keyboard inputs from cats.
- ▪Users can lock their keyboard with a click or keyboard shortcut.
- ▪The app includes deterrent sounds and a Stealth Mode for discreet use.
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| Original publisher | Engadget |
| Canonical URL | https://www.engadget.com/2174922/cats-lock-mac-app-locks-keyboard-to-prevent-chaos-when-your-cat-tramples-all-over-it/ |
| Publication time | Sun, 17 May 2026 16:53:29 +0000 |
| Retrieval time | 2026-05-17T17:03:20.824Z |
| Last seen | 2026-05-17T17:03:20.824Z |
| Headline source | Publisher (no WeSearch rewrite) |
| Excerpt source | publisher body |
| Excerpt method | First ~120 words (~800 chars) of extracted publisher body, fair-use limited. |
| Summary | WeSearch · cerebras-chat (WeSearch summarizer) |
| Summary source text | contentText |
| Citation coverage | Summary is a WeSearch-generated derivative; primary citation is the original publisher URL. |
| Cluster | 2h40CXnokHie · 2 stories |
| Cluster logic | Grouped by semantic title/content similarity across sources within a rolling window. Same-publisher template collisions are excluded from coverage comparison. |
| Ranking reason | Story pages are not engagement-ranked. Hub feeds use recency, with optional source-diversified chronological ordering (cap consecutive stories per source). No personalized ranking. |
| Publisher visit | Yes — open original |
| Substitutes article? | No — link-out required for full text |
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| Indexing | May the item be indexed (stored, ranked, made findable)? | Allowed |
| Snippet | May a short excerpt of the publisher's text be shown? | Allowed |
| AI summary | May WeSearch generate its own short summary of the article? | Limited |
| Retrieval / RAG | May the content be exposed for third-party retrieval-augmented generation? | Not asserted |
| Model training | May the content be used to train AI models? | Not asserted |
| Commercial reuse | May the content be reused commercially? | Not permitted |
Basis: Derived from the published RSS/Atom feed. Contact: [email protected]. Reviewed: 2026-07-24.
Opening excerpt (first ~120 words) tap to expand
News Computing This new Mac app locks the keyboard to prevent chaos when your cat tramples all over it By Cheyenne MacDonald May 17, 2026 12:53 pm EST Todd Alexander A $3 Mac app that hit the App Store this weekend aims to solve a very specific, but very common problem: accidental inputs from cats walking, sitting and sprawling out on keyboards. Cats Lock is exactly what it sounds like. It offers a way to quickly lock your keyboard, either with one click from the menu bar or using a keyboard shortcut, to block all typing when there's a risk of a feline invasion. It even has deterrent sounds to choose from, like one that will warn you when a cat has stepped onto the keyboard, and the option to record your own.
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Excerpt limited to ~120 words for fair-use compliance. The full article is at Engadget.
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