RottingApple

PC-to-Apple TV AirPlay screen mirroring for Windows and Linux.

RottingApple acts as an AirPlay 2 sender: it discovers Apple TVs on your LAN, pairs with a PIN, captures your desktop, encodes H.264 video, and streams it to the TV.

Features

• mDNS discovery of Apple TVs (_airplay._tcp)
• Legacy AirPlay pair-setup-pin pairing with credential persistence
• Screen mirroring (mirror mode)
• Linux capture via X11 (Wayland via XWayland)
• Windows capture via DXGI Desktop Duplication
• Virtual-display-only capture for extend-like workflows (experimental)
• Test mode with synthetic video (no display server required)
• Experimental audio mirroring hook (AAC-ELD pipeline stub)

Requirements

Linux

• Rust 1.85+ (edition 2024)
• X11 display server (or XWayland on Wayland)
• Network access to Apple TV on the same subnet

Windows

• Rust 1.85+
• Windows 10/11 with DXGI-capable GPU
• Apple TV on the same network
• openh264-2.6.0-win64.dll and fpsap-helper.exe next to rottingapple.exe (built by scripts/build-windows.sh)

Apple TV

• AirPlay enabled: Settings → AirPlay and HomeKit
• Note the 4-digit PIN when pairing (displayed on TV after pairing starts)

Build

cargo build --release

Binary: target/release/rottingapple

Cross-compile for Windows (from Linux/WSL)

Install MinGW and the Rust Windows target, then build:

# One-time setup (Ubuntu/Debian/WSL)
sudo apt install mingw-w64
rustup target add x86_64-pc-windows-gnu

# Build
./scripts/build-windows.sh

Output: target/x86_64-pc-windows-gnu/release/rottingapple.exe

Copy that .exe to Windows and run it in PowerShell or cmd. This build uses the DXGI capture backend and mirrors the Windows desktop (not the WSL Linux environment).

.\rottingapple.exe discover
.\rottingapple.exe mirror --target 192.168.1.50

The MinGW-linked binary requires no MSVC runtime. Windows may prompt for firewall access on first run.

Usage

# Discover Apple TVs on the LAN
rottingapple discover

# Pair (first time — enter PIN when prompted after it appears on TV)
rottingapple pair --target 192.168.1.50

# Pair non-interactively (scripts / CI)
rottingapple pair --target 192.168.1.50 --pin 1234

# Mirror primary display
rottingapple mirror --target 192.168.1.50

# Mirror with options (software OpenH264 encoder)
rottingapple mirror --target appletv.local --width 1920 --height 1080 --fps 30 --hwaccel none

# Test mode (synthetic pattern, no screen capture)
rottingapple mirror --target 192.168.1.50 --test

# Extend-like mode: capture only virtual displays (experimental)
rottingapple mirror --target 192.168.1.50 --virtual-display --display 1

Credentials

Pairing credentials are stored at:

~/.config/rottingapple/credentials.json

On Linux/macOS the config directory is created with mode 0700 and the credentials file with mode 0600.

Override with --creds /path/to/creds.json.

Debug logging

Optional developer trace logs (disabled by default):

ROTTINGAPPLE_DEBUG_LOG=1 rottingapple mirror --target 192.168.1.50 --test

Architecture

crates/
  rotten-core/       Config, device types, errors
  rotten-discovery/  mDNS browse + manual target resolve
  rotten-crypto/     SRP, ChaCha20-Poly1305, FairPlay SAP
  rotten-pairing/    Legacy pair-setup-pin (+ experimental HAP stub)
  rotten-protocol/   HTTP mirror setup + RTSP session
  rotten-video/      H.264 encode (OpenH264 software), frame pacing, encrypted stream
  rotten-capture/    X11 (Linux) / DXGI (Windows) backends
  rotten-app/        CLI binary

Extend display (virtual monitor)

Native AirPlay extend is not available from non-Apple senders. For extend-like behavior:

1. Install a virtual display driver (e.g. Virtual Display Driver on Windows).
2. Configure it as an extended desktop in OS display settings.
3. Run rottingapple mirror --virtual-display --display <index>.

Limitations

• Pairing uses legacy pair-setup-pin, not full HomeKit Accessory Protocol pairing.
• FairPlay fp-setup requires fpsap-helper (GPL-3.0) as a separate binary; see THIRD_PARTY_NOTICES.md.
• Video encoding uses OpenH264 software only; --hwaccel nvenc / vaapi are not implemented yet.
• Audio mirroring is experimental.
• Corporate networks blocking mDNS require --target <ip>.

License

MIT OR Apache-2.0 for the RottingApple application code.

Third-party components (OpenH264, Playfair, fpsap-helper) have separate licenses — see THIRD_PARTY_NOTICES.md.