OverC Clips

Cut clips out of a video for analysis — in a web page, on your own computer. Nothing to learn, no command line.

Paste a YouTube link or pick a file on your computer, mark the start and end of each clip, and it makes them. It runs a small web page on your own machine, so the videos and the clips stay with you — you can also open that page from your phone on the same wifi and use it as the remote while the computer does the work.

Mac

Download for macOS

Nothing needs to be installed first — the installer brings its own Python if this Mac has none.

Comfortable pasting one line? Skip the security warning entirely. 
curl -LsSf https://zedd.org/overc-clips/install.sh?v=0.6.42 | sh

Paste that into Terminal. It installs exactly the same thing, and macOS does not flag it — the warning below applies to files downloaded by a browser, which this is not.

  1. Open the downloaded zip, then double-click Install OverC Clips.
  2. macOS will very likely refuse it the first time — see just below.
  3. A Terminal window shows the progress. When it finishes, close it.
  4. Start it any time from the OverC Clips icon on your Desktop.

macOS will say it is from an unidentified developer.

That appears for anything downloaded from the internet that Apple has not been paid to certify. It is not a sign that something is wrong with the file.

On macOS 15 and later there is no right-click shortcut for this — that dialog only offers Move to Trash. The way through is:

  1. Double-click the installer and dismiss the warning.
  2. Press ⌘ Space, type Privacy, press Return.
  3. Scroll to Security and click Open Anyway next to the message about Install OverC Clips.
  4. Double-click the installer again.

That Open Anyway button only appears after you have tried to open the file once; looking before trying shows nothing. You only see any of this once — the Desktop icon it creates is made on your own machine and starts without a warning.

Linux

curl -LsSf https://zedd.org/overc-clips/install.sh?v=0.6.42 | sh

Adds OverC Clips to your applications menu. Needs Python 3.10+ and python3-venv on Debian and Ubuntu.

Windows

Download for Windows

Needs Windows 10 or later. Nothing needs to be installed first — the installer brings its own Python if this computer has none, and never asks for an administrator password.

Being tested — expect rough edges. This installer works in principle but has not yet been through a full run on a managed or locked-down machine. If it stops with an error, the message in the black window is the useful part.

  1. Open the downloaded zip and double-click Install OverC Clips.
  2. Windows will likely show a blue "Windows protected your PC" box. Click More info, then Run anyway. That appears for anything downloaded that has not been through paid code-signing.
  3. A black window shows the progress. Close it when it finishes.
  4. Watch your antivirus while it installs and the first time you run it. Some of them block the program silently, and then it simply does not work — see below.
  5. Start it from the OverC Clips icon on your Desktop.

If your antivirus blocks it. OverC Clips is not code-signed, and some antivirus software stops unsigned programs without telling you clearly. Norton has been seen blocking pythonw.exe, which is the part that actually runs OverC Clips, and the symptoms are confusing: the page opens but nothing works, clips stop part way, updates do nothing, or the program keeps disappearing.

Watch for a notification from your antivirus while the installer runs and the first time you start the program, and allow it when asked — that one click is usually the whole fix. If you miss the prompt, add %LOCALAPPDATA%\overc-clips to your antivirus's list of allowed or excluded folders, then install again.

This was found by a tester whose newer laptop would not work while his older one did: same house, same network, same download. Norton had blocked it on one and not the other.

The first time you run it, Windows may ask whether to allow it through the firewall — that needs an administrator. Allowing it lets you use the app from your phone on the same wifi; declining leaves it working on the computer itself.

Using it

Starting OverC Clips puts a small icon in the menu bar on a Mac, or the notification area by the clock on Windows, and opens the page in your browser. That icon opens the page again later, shows the address to type on your phone, and stops the program. There is no window to keep open.

Double-clicking the Desktop icon again simply opens the page, so you never have to hunt for the small icon. On Windows it is hidden by default — click the ^ arrow by the clock, or look in Settings → Personalisation → Taskbar → Other system tray icons, where it may be listed as Python with the blue OverC Clips picture. If it never appears, what happened is written to %LOCALAPPDATA%\overc-clips\overc-clips.log on Windows or ~/Library/Logs/overc-clips.log on a Mac.

Already comfortable with Python?

pipx install overc-clips
overc-clips serve

Plain pip install into the system Python is refused on current macOS and most Linux distributions — that is the operating system protecting its own Python, not a problem with this package. pipx, or a virtualenv, avoids it. The installers above simply do that for you.

If a download suddenly stops working

YouTube changes things regularly, and an out-of-date downloader is almost always the reason a video that worked last week fails today. Open the menu, go to Settings, and press Update now. It is safe to do while clips are being made.

Removing it

Everything lives in your own account. Delete ~/.local/share/overc-clips and the Desktop or menu shortcut. Your clips are left alone.

What it installs

Everything goes in your own user folder — nothing system-wide, and no administrator password. To remove it, delete the folder named under Removing it below.

If the computer has no suitable Python, the installer fetches one using uv, a small open-source installer tool. You do not need to install uv yourself and it is not left on your PATH — it is downloaded into OverC Clips' own folder and used from there. It also brings ffmpeg and yt-dlp, which do the video work.