Dial Controller

A lightweight macOS menu bar app that turns the Ulanzi Dial D100H into a fully customisable shortcut launcher.

What it does

The Ulanzi Dial D100H presents itself as a standard HID keyboard — every button and the scroll wheel emit hardcoded key combos (Cmd+V, Cmd+C, media keys, volume, etc.). Dial Controller intercepts those events before they reach any other app, suppresses them, and fires whatever shortcut you assigned instead.

• 7 buttons + scroll wheel (clockwise / counter-clockwise), all mappable
• Any shortcut — including multi-modifier combos and global hotkeys registered by other apps
• Assignments survive restarts (stored in UserDefaults)
• No Dock icon, lives entirely in the menu bar

Requirements

• macOS 13 Ventura or later (tested on macOS 26 Tahoe)
• Ulanzi Dial D100H (VID 0xFFF1, PID 0x0082)
• Accessibility access must be granted in System Settings → Privacy & Security → Accessibility

Installation

1. Download DialController.app.zip from the latest release
2. Unzip and move DialController.app to /Applications
3. Launch the app — macOS will ask for Accessibility permission; grant it and relaunch
4. The dial icon appears in the menu bar

Usage

Click the menu bar icon to open the configuration popover.

Action	How
Map a button	Click Learn, press the dial button you want to map, then record the shortcut
Map scroll wheel	Click Learn, turn the dial (CW or CCW), then record the shortcut
Remove a mapping	Click the × next to any entry

The app intercepts the dial's built-in events system-wide, so mappings work in any app.

Building from source

Requires Xcode Command Line Tools.

git clone https://github.com/noestreich/DialController.git
cd DialController
make run        # build, bundle (ad-hoc signed), and launch

For a Developer-ID-signed and notarised build:

# One-time: store your Apple notary credentials
xcrun notarytool store-credentials DialControllerNotary \
    --apple-id "you@example.com" \
    --team-id "TEAMID" \
    --password "xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx"

make release DEV_ID="Developer ID Application: Your Name (TEAMID)"

How it works

• HIDManager — opens the device via IOHIDManager, seizes it exclusively, and collects button/dial events. Because the Ulanzi fires the entire press+release sequence in ~300 µs (modifier after key, unlike normal keyboards), emission is delayed 25 ms so all IOKit callbacks of a burst arrive before the shortcut is dispatched.
• EventSuppressor — an always-active CGEventTap at session level. When HIDManager detects a dial event it calls suppressNext(), which opens a 100 ms suppression window. Any keyDown/keyUp/flagsChanged that arrives during that window is dropped before reaching other apps.
• ShortcutRecorder — records shortcuts via a CGEventTap (not NSEvent) so it sees events even when another app holds a global hotkey via RegisterEventHotKey. Uses CGEventSource(stateID: .privateState) when translating key codes so held modifiers don't bleed into the displayed character.
• KeySender — synthesises events with a private CGEventSource and marks them with a custom userData tag so EventSuppressor lets them pass through.

License

MIT