NetNeighbor

NetNeighbor discovers and monitors devices on your local network — a modern equivalent of the Windows Network Neighborhood experience. Runs on Windows, Linux and macOS.

Features

• Automatic discovery — SSDP, mDNS/Bonjour, WS-Discovery, NetBIOS; no active port scan
• Instant startup — previously-seen devices appear from cache in < 100 ms
• List and icon grid views with sidebar categories (by type or location)
• Open devices in one click — HTTP, HTTPS, SMB, SSH, FTP, SFTP, Telnet with configurable priority
• Per-device overrides — custom name, type, location, icon, and connection commands
• Icon packs — switch between icon themes; install community packs or create your own
• System tray — minimize to tray, start minimized, session autostart
• Localised — French, Spanish, German, Italian, Dutch, Japanese, Chinese (Simplified/Traditional)
• Packaged as .exe + installer (Windows), .dmg (macOS), .deb (Ubuntu/Mint/Debian), .AppImage, and tarball

Download

Latest release: GitHub Releases

Available formats: .exe · .dmg (Apple Silicon & Intel) · .deb · .AppImage · .tar.gz

Requirements

Platform	Requirement
Windows	Windows 10 or later
Linux	Ubuntu 22.04+, Linux Mint 21+, Debian 12+, or equivalent
macOS (Apple Silicon)	macOS 12 (Monterey) or later
macOS (Intel)	macOS 11 (Big Sur) or later
From source	Python 3.10+ · PySide6 6.5+

Install

Windows installer:

NetNeighbor-2.x.y-win64-setup.exe

Note: the installer is not code-signed. Windows Defender SmartScreen may show a warning — click More info → Run anyway.

macOS:

Open NetNeighbor-2.x.y-macos-arm64.dmg (Apple Silicon) or NetNeighbor-2.x.y-macos-intel.dmg (Intel), then drag NetNeighbor to Applications.

Note: the app is not notarized. On first launch Gatekeeper may block it — right-click → Open → Open, or run xattr -cr /Applications/NetNeighbor.app in Terminal.

.deb package (recommended, Linux):

sudo dpkg -i netneighbor_2.x.y_amd64.deb

.AppImage (Linux):

chmod +x NetNeighbor-2.x.y-x86_64.AppImage
./NetNeighbor-2.x.y-x86_64.AppImage

Tarball (Linux):

tar -xzf netneighbor-2.x.y.tar.gz
cd netneighbor-2.x.y
bash install-user-desktop.sh   # optional: add menu shortcut
bash run.sh

Run from source

Linux / macOS:

python3 -m venv .venv
source .venv/bin/activate
pip install -r requirements.txt
python main.py

Windows:

python -m venv .venv
.venv\Scripts\activate
pip install -r requirements.txt
python main.py

Documentation

User documentation: USER_DOCUMENTATION.md

Developer documentation: docs/README.md

Translations

Language	Code	Status
French	fr	Complete
Italian	it	Complete
Spanish	es	Complete
German	de	Complete
Dutch	nl	Complete
Traditional Chinese	zh_TW	Complete
Simplified Chinese	zh_CN	Complete
Japanese	ja	Complete

Compile after editing a .po file:

msgfmt app/locale/fr/LC_MESSAGES/netneighbor.po -o app/locale/fr/LC_MESSAGES/netneighbor.mo

Test in a specific language:

LANG=fr_FR.UTF-8 python app/main.py

Full i18n workflow: docs/contributing/I18N.md

Icon packs

Five community icon packs are available in icons_packs/:

Pack	Style
Cartoon	Funny cartoon-style icons
Clay 3D	Colourful 3D clay-style icons
Dark RGB	Dark theme with RGB accent colours
OSX Aqua	macOS Aqua-inspired look
Pinky	Pink glossy-style icons
White Frost	Flat white / frosted glass
Windows 11 Fluent	Windows 11 Fluent Design

Copy a pack folder to ~/.config/netneighbor_icon_packs/, rename infopack.json → iconpack.json and {name}_preview.png → preview.png, then select it in Preferences → General → Icon pack.

Full instructions and pack format: icons_packs/README.md

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Autodetection and corrections

Device names and types are inferred from protocol announcements — they are best-effort. Use right-click → Type / Rename / Location / Icon for per-device corrections. Community rule overlays: docs/contributing/COMMUNITY_OVERRIDES.md.

Pending work and roadmap

docs/ROADMAP.md

Contribution and maintenance notes: docs/operations/MAINTENANCE.md