Recit

Record it - A beautiful terminal-based screen recorder for Linux

Recit is a modern, elegant screen recording tool with a beautiful terminal user interface (TUI). Record your screen, capture specific areas, and save screenshots - all from a gorgeous terminal interface powered by Textual.

✨ Features

• 🎬 Full Screen Recording - Capture your entire screen
• 🎯 Area Selection - Record specific regions with visual selection tool
• 📸 Screenshots - Save PNG or WebP screenshots of selected areas
• 🎨 Beautiful Themes - 9 Base2Tone color themes + built-in Textual themes
• ⚙️ Configurable - Customize format, resolution, framerate via config file
• ⌨️ Keyboard Shortcuts - Navigate and control everything from your keyboard
• 💾 Smart Scaling - Automatic aspect ratio preservation
• 🖥️ Monitor Detection - Automatic monitor resolution detection

📸 Screenshot

Recit's beautiful TUI interface with textual-dark theme

🚀 Installation

Prerequisites

System packages:

# Debian/Ubuntu/Mint
sudo apt install ffmpeg slop scrot imagemagick

# Fedora
sudo dnf install ffmpeg slop scrot ImageMagick

# Arch Linux
sudo pacman -S ffmpeg slop scrot imagemagick

Python packages:

pip install -r requirements.txt

Quick Start

1. Clone the repository:

git clone https://github.com/yourusername/recit.git
cd recit

2. Install dependencies:

pip install -r requirements.txt

3. Make the launcher executable:

chmod +x recit

4. Run Recit:

./recit

Optional: System-wide Installation

# Copy to /usr/local/bin
sudo cp recit /usr/local/bin/
sudo cp recit.py /usr/local/bin/
sudo cp monitor_utils.py /usr/local/bin/

# Now run from anywhere
recit

Optional: Keyboard Shortcut

Set up a custom keyboard shortcut to launch Recit instantly:

Linux Mint / Cinnamon:

1. Open Menu → Preferences → Keyboard → Shortcuts → Custom Shortcuts
2. Click Add custom shortcut
3. Name: Recit
4. Command: /path/to/recit (or /usr/local/bin/recit if installed system-wide)
5. Click Apply
6. Click the new shortcut and press your desired key combination (e.g., Ctrl+Alt+R)

GNOME / Ubuntu:

1. Open Settings → Keyboard → Custom Shortcuts
2. Click + to add a new shortcut
3. Name: Recit
4. Command: /path/to/recit
5. Click Set Shortcut and press your key combination

KDE Plasma:

1. Open System Settings → Shortcuts → Custom Shortcuts
2. Edit → New → Global Shortcut → Command/URL
3. Set the command and assign your key combination

⌨️ Keyboard Shortcuts

Key	Action
r	Start full screen recording
a	Start area selection recording
s	Stop current recording
m	Show monitor information
c	Open configuration menu (change themes)
q	Quit application

⚙️ Configuration

Recit stores its configuration in ~/.config/recit/config.json:

{
  "output_dir": "/home/user/Videos/Recordings",
  "format": "webm",
  "framerate": 30,
  "resolution": "720p",
  "quality": "high",
  "hotkey": "ctrl+shift+r",
  "theme": "base2tone-evening"
}

Available Options

• format: webm or mp4
• framerate: 15, 30, or 60
• resolution: 480p, 720p, or 1080p (full screen only)
• theme: See available themes with c → Change theme

🎨 Themes

Recit includes 9 custom Base2Tone themes plus built-in Textual themes:

Base2Tone Themes:

• Evening (purple/orange)
• Sea (teal/orange)
• Forest (green/brown)
• Field (teal/red)
• Desert (beige/brown)
• Drawbridge (blue/orange)
• Earth (brown/orange)
• Lake (blue/orange)
• Meadow (blue/yellow)

Built-in Themes:

• textual-dark
• nord
• gruvbox
• dracula
• textual-ansi

Press c to open the config menu and change themes on the fly!

📁 Project Structure

recit/
├── recit           # Launch script
├── recit.py        # Main TUI application
├── monitor_utils.py # Monitor detection utilities
└── requirements.txt # Python dependencies

🛠️ Technical Details

• TUI Framework: Textual
• Video Encoding: FFmpeg with VP9 codec (WebM)
• Area Selection: slop
• Screenshots: scrot + ImageMagick
• Monitor Detection: xrandr

🤝 Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please feel free to submit a Pull Request.

📝 License

MIT License - feel free to use this project however you'd like!

🙏 Acknowledgments

• Built with Textual by Textualize
• Base2Tone themes by Bram de Haan
• Inspired by GNOME Screen Recorder

📧 Contact

Created by theSmuz

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Recit - Record it with style! 🎬