A BLE UART terminal for macOS
Nordic UART Service and HM-10 from a Mac, why there is no baud rate to set, and the 20 byte packet limit that makes a working link look broken.
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BaudBuddy
The console toolkit for the kit that keeps everything running.
On the App Storev1.0 · Available for Mac
A native macOS console toolkit for switches, routers, firewalls, PLCs, embedded boards and test gear. Talk to them over USB serial, Bluetooth LE or a network console server: then serve firmware and take configuration backups from the same Mac, over TFTP, HTTP, HTTPS, FTP or SFTP.
Three ways to connect
USB serial, Bluetooth LE, and network console servers.
Five file servers
TFTP, HTTP, HTTPS, FTP and SFTP, from one chosen folder.
Four transfer protocols
XMODEM, XMODEM-1K, YMODEM, and resumable ZMODEM.
Private by construction
No account, analytics, telemetry, cloud or silent network traffic.
One place to start
Your adapters, saved profiles, console servers and services, clearly organised.
BaudBuddy identifies serial hardware by name and by stable USB identity, keeps reusable connections within reach, and makes every active service visible.
Connections
Use the cable you have, or no cable at all.
Every transport gets the controls it can honestly support. Serial sessions expose line settings and a real hardware break; Bluetooth does not pretend to have baud or parity; RFC 2217 can set the port at the far end.
USB
USB serial adapters
Hot-plug detection, stable hardware identity, custom baud rates, data bits, parity, stop bits, flow control, and a real break.
BLE
Bluetooth LE UART
Nordic UART Service and HM-10 serial bridges, with scanning, reconnecting, reusable profiles and live signal strength.
NET
Console servers
Raw TCP, full Telnet negotiation, and RFC 2217 with remote line settings, modem status and a real remote break.
Built for the actual job
More than a terminal window.
BaudBuddy keeps the byte stream exact while adding the tools that make difficult consoles understandable, repeatable and safer to work with.
01
A terminal that tells the truth
xterm, xterm-256color, VT100, VT102, VT220, Linux console and ANSI identities. Unsupported capabilities stay unavailable rather than being simulated badly.
02
Traffic inspector
Every byte sent and received, split by direction, with timestamps, text and hex views, filtering, export, and a frozen display that never pauses capture.
03
Guided diagnostics
Port conflicts, wrong rates, silent connections, line-ending mistakes, flow-control problems, disconnect loops and missing drivers, detected from observed state alone.
04
Transfers over the line
Send and receive with XMODEM, XMODEM-1K, YMODEM and ZMODEM. Track progress and retries; resume ZMODEM from the damaged offset.
05
Logs, timestamps and highlights
Stream readable or byte-exact logs to disk, draw timestamps beside the data rather than inside it, and colour literal or regular-expression patterns as they arrive.
06
Safe command entry
Raw terminal input, or compose a whole line before sending. Command history, paced paste, reusable text or hex snippets, and keyboard shortcuts.
07
Modbus and live plots
Passively decode Modbus RTU or TCP in the inspector, check CRCs, read register values, and plot numeric series that devices print in real time.
08
Triggers and automation
React to a received line with a note, a sound, logging, or explicitly authorised text. A loopback-only control socket gives scripts a guarded, documented API.
09
A break that reaches the boot monitor
Assert a real hardware break once, or repeat it across a boot window while the terminal stays visible, so you can stop at the prompt.
10
Help that works offline
A searchable 24-article manual ships inside the app, so the answer is there when the network is not.
Ready for the next console job?
One Mac app, from first connection to final backup.
Open the terminal, diagnose the link, transfer the firmware, and serve or receive files without rebuilding your setup across separate tools.
Built-in file server
Put firmware where the hardware can reach it.
Choose one folder, pick the protocols you need, and let equipment pull firmware from your Mac or write configuration backups to it. Every request, refusal, retry and completed transfer appears in a live console.
- TFTP
- HTTP
- HTTPS
- FTP
- SFTP
Visible and auditable
The shared files, exact addresses, ports, certificate fingerprint, connected clients, byte counts, speed and protocol messages all stay on screen.
Uploads stay deliberate
Serving files and accepting them are separate choices. Nothing is writable because something else was switched on.
Serial file transfer
Choose the protocol that carries what your equipment needs.
| Block | File name | Exact length | Resume | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| XMODEM | 128 bytes | No | No, padded | No |
| XMODEM-1K | 1024 bytes | No | No, padded | No |
| YMODEM | 1024 bytes | Yes | Yes | No |
| ZMODEM | Streaming, 8 KB window | Yes | Yes | From the damaged offset |
Clear limits
The controls on screen correspond to something BaudBuddy can really do.
It does not fake a hardware break by transmitting data, reopen ports without permission, invent handshake state, or offer line settings over Bluetooth where none exist. It deliberately does not provide an interactive SSH shell: for console servers it focuses on raw TCP, Telnet and RFC 2217, and SFTP belongs to the separate, sandboxed file server rooted in the folder you choose.
The real app
No composites. No invented sessions.
Direct captures of BaudBuddy running on macOS, including the real USB serial adapter and the Bluetooth peripheral used during verification.
Private by construction
Your terminal is not somebody else's dataset.
No account, analytics, telemetry, advertising, cloud sync, third-party crash reporter, licence check or automatic update ping. BaudBuddy makes a network connection only when you configure and start one.
Credentials, host keys, certificates and automation tokens are stored locally in the macOS Keychain. Diagnostic logs record byte counts, not terminal contents, and the app's servers stay off until you switch them on.
Requirements
Use the hardware already in your bag.
Mac
macOS 14 Sonoma or later, on Apple silicon or Intel.
Serial
Any adapter macOS publishes as a serial device, including standard USB CDC devices.
Bluetooth
A Nordic UART Service or HM-10 compatible BLE serial bridge.
Network
A raw TCP, Telnet or RFC 2217 console endpoint, or no extra hardware at all.
For the next maintenance window
Put BaudBuddy on the Mac you take to the equipment.
No account or setup service. Install it from the Mac App Store and keep the toolkit ready for the next console session.
Under the hood
Built with
- SwiftUI
- AppKit
- Swift 6
- termios
- IOKit
- Network.framework
- CoreBluetooth
- SwiftNIO SSH
Exports
- TXT
- Raw
- JSON
Requires
- macOS 14 or later
Good to know
- 15 languages
- Works offline
- No account needed
Privacy
Local-first, and that is the whole of it: no account, no cloud, no analytics, no telemetry. Connections go straight from your Mac to the device or host you name.
Guides
A serial terminal for Cisco switches on a Mac
Console settings that actually work, why pasting a config drops characters, and what to do when the terminal type matters more than you expected.
Read the guideAn RFC 2217 client for the Mac
Raw TCP gets you the bytes. RFC 2217 gets you the baud rate, the handshake lines and a real break on a port in another building. What it does, and how to tell when a server only pretends to support it.
Read the guideHow to console into a switch from a MacBook
No serial port, one cable that is not Ethernet, and a choice between screen and something better. What to buy, what to plug where, and what to type.
Read the guideRun an SFTP server for network equipment from your Mac
Serve firmware and configuration files from a controlled folder with BaudBuddy, without enabling a general-purpose remote shell on your Mac.
Read the guideRunning a TFTP server on a Mac
A switch wants its firmware over TFTP and macOS no longer makes that easy. What the built-in daemon still does, the two things that break uploads, and the 32 MB limit nobody mentions.
Read the guideSending a break to Cisco equipment, and why it usually fails
Password recovery needs a real break condition, not a keystroke. Why some adapters cannot produce one, why switches do not use it at all, and the recovery sequence for both.
Read the guideUSB to serial adapter not showing up on a Mac
Which chipsets work without a driver, why counterfeit Prolific parts fail on purpose, and the difference between cu and tty that hangs a terminal forever.
Read the guideXMODEM, YMODEM and ZMODEM on macOS
Four protocols from the modem era, still the only way into a device with no network. Which one your equipment actually supports, and why an IOS image at 9600 takes eleven hours.
Read the guideYour serial console shows nothing. Now what?
A cable is in, the light is on, and the terminal is blank. The causes in the order they actually occur, and how to tell them apart from what you can see.
Read the guide