earctl

An Alfred workflow for controlling the noise cancellation mode on Nothing Ear 2 headphones from macOS.

Disclaimer: This is an unofficial, community-made tool and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or associated with Nothing Technology Limited in any way. "Nothing" and "Nothing Ear" are trademarks of Nothing Technology Limited.

Features

Type ear in Alfred to check battery or switch between all ANC modes:

	Description
Battery	Show battery level for each earbud
Off	Disable noise control entirely
Transparency	Let ambient sound through
Noise Cancellation (High)	Maximum noise blocking
Noise Cancellation (Mid)	Moderate noise blocking
Noise Cancellation (Low)	Light noise blocking
Adaptive	Automatically adjusts based on environment

Usage

1. Open Alfred (⌘ Space or your configured hotkey)
2. Type ear and press Enter to expand the mode list
3. Select a mode and press Enter — the mode changes immediately

Requirements

• macOS 12 Monterey or later
• Alfred 5 with the Powerpack (required for workflows)
• Nothing Ear 2 headphones paired to your Mac via Bluetooth

Other Nothing Ear models (Ear (1), Ear (a), CMF Buds etc.) likely use the same protocol and may work, but have not been tested.

Installation

1. Download NothingEar2.alfredworkflow from this repo
2. Double-click it to import into Alfred
3. Grant Alfred Bluetooth permission — see Troubleshooting

Dependencies

The CLI is written in Swift and uses only Apple frameworks — no third-party dependencies.

Dependency	Version	Notes
macOS	12+	IOBluetooth RFCOMM support
Swift	5.7+	Bundled with Xcode 14+
Xcode Command Line Tools	any	Required to build
Alfred	5.x	Workflow host
Alfred Powerpack	any	Required for workflows

To install Xcode Command Line Tools if not already present:

xcode-select --install

Building from source

# Clone the repo
git clone https://github.com/xhain/earctl
cd earctl

# Build the CLI binary
cd cli
swift build -c release
cp .build/release/nothing-ctl ../workflow/bin/nothing-ctl
cd ..

# Package the Alfred workflow
cd workflow
zip -r ../NothingEar2.alfredworkflow . -x "*.DS_Store"
cd ..

Then double-click NothingEar2.alfredworkflow to import into Alfred.

To verify the CLI works before importing:

workflow/bin/nothing-ctl battery
# → L  82%  R  79%

workflow/bin/nothing-ctl anc high
# → Noise Cancellation (High)

How it works

The workflow bundles a Swift CLI tool (nothing-ctl) that communicates with the Nothing Ear 2 over Classic Bluetooth RFCOMM using macOS's IOBluetooth framework — no BLE, no third-party libraries.

The correct control channel is identified by the NT Link service UUID (aeac4a03-dff5-498f-843a-34487cf133eb) via SDP discovery, not by the service name. Commands follow the Nothing wire protocol:

[0x55, 0x60, 0x01, cmdH, cmdL, payloadLen, 0x00, FSN, ...payload, crc16L, crc16H]

CRC16/ARC (init=0xFFFF, poly=0xA001) over all bytes before the CRC. ANC is set via CMD_SET_ANC = 0x0FF0 with a 3-byte payload [0x01, mode, 0x00].

Sources & Inspiration

• DaanHessen/earctl — the main protocol reference; our code direction follows this closely
• sn99/nothing-linux — protocol documentation for Nothing devices on Linux
• jccit/NothingEarMac — earlier macOS attempt using IOBluetooth
• bharadwaj-raju blog — write-up on the Nothing protocol

Troubleshooting

Alfred doesn't change the mode / nothing happens

Alfred needs Bluetooth permission.

1. Open System Settings → Privacy & Security → Bluetooth
2. Find Alfred in the list and make sure it's enabled
3. If Alfred isn't listed, try running the workflow once — macOS may prompt for permission

Battery result doesn't appear

Alfred needs notification permission.

1. Open System Settings → Notifications → Alfred
2. Make sure Allow Notifications is on and the alert style is not None
3. Check that Focus / Do Not Disturb is not muting notifications

"Nothing Ear 2 not connected"

Make sure your Nothing Ear 2 are:

• In your ears (they disconnect when in the case)
• Connected to your Mac via Bluetooth (check the menu bar)

Gatekeeper / "unidentified developer" warning

The bundled nothing-ctl binary is not signed with an Apple Developer certificate. The workflow automatically strips the macOS quarantine flag on first run (xattr -d com.apple.quarantine) so Gatekeeper won't block it. If you'd rather not rely on this, you can build the binary from source — compiled locally, it carries no quarantine flag.

First run is slow

The first command after a long idle may take 2–3 seconds while the RFCOMM channel is opened. Subsequent commands are faster.

Rebuilding after macOS update

If the binary stops working after a macOS update, rebuild and reinstall:

cd cli && swift build -c release
cp .build/release/nothing-ctl ../workflow/bin/nothing-ctl
cd ../workflow && zip -r ../NothingEar2.alfredworkflow . -x "*.DS_Store"

Then double-click NothingEar2.alfredworkflow to reimport.