Drop shelf (drag files onto the notch)

What it is

Drag files onto your MacBook's notch (or the top centre of any other screen) and it opens into a small panel that asks what to do with them. Pick the screens in Settings > System > Show it on: all screens, the one with the notch, or the main screen. Click the hint to pick files instead of dragging. Aden reads the files first, so it only offers what fits:

• A bounce becomes a track, with the people, BPM, key and tags from its name already filled in. A bounce named after a track you have goes to that track as a new version.
• Several bounces become a track each, or one track with every file as a version.
• A DAW project, a project folder or stems become a track's project files.
• A contract, split sheet, lyrics or royalty statement go to the track they are named after, or to your team's files, labelled with what they are.
• Anything can go out as a transfer. Several files or a folder travel as one zip, and the link is copied for you.
• On a Mac, anything can go by AirDrop: macOS's own AirDrop window opens with the people nearby. The files stay on the shelf. AirDrop is also in the "…" menu, on every file in search (⌘K), and as "AirDrop files" there.

Start dragging a file anywhere and the notch glows and peeks out with the Aden logo, brighter and bigger as you get closer, so you can see where to drop it from across the screen.

On Windows there is no notch, so the same shape appears at the top centre of the screen only while you drag a file, and goes away when you let go. The notch bar and its shortcuts are Mac only.

Press play on a bounce to hear it right in the shelf, without it landing in Aden's player. The "…" (on hover) has the same file actions as search (play in Aden, queue, send a demo, a transfer, move to a team, show in Finder). The team the files go to is the one left of the notch (or the app's switcher on Home): switching it there plans the files again. The expand button opens the same files at the top of Home in the app, where dropping files does the same.

Click away and the files wait on the shelf: rest the pointer on the notch to get them back. They clear after the time set in Settings > System > Keep dropped files (or when you press Cancel). Always show the notch bar (on by default) keeps your team beside the notch. On its right sit up to three Notch shortcuts (Home, Web app, Files, Links, Organisation; set in Settings). Right-click the notch to hide or show the bar; hidden, it still wakes when you drag files. While you are in a live session a small red "Live" replaces them and opens the session in the app.

Drop files on a track's page in the app and they go straight onto that track the same way, without the shelf: a project or project folder becomes its project files, a contract or statement a labelled document.

Drop more files onto the open shelf and they join the stack; the suggestions change to fit the whole pile. Hover the stack to see every file, play a bounce or take a file off. Cancel (or Escape) puts the shelf away. While an upload runs the shelf shows how many bytes are sent, and its ✕ stops it and rolls it back: the tracks, versions, documents, session recordings and transfer it already made are deleted, rows and stored files both (POST /api/v1/uploads/discard, limited to what you created in the last hour).

The shelf lists the few actions that fit the files; typing in its small search finds everything else by name ("queue", "Finder", "move"). Nothing is picked until you pick it. Escape closes; the ✕ clears the shelf.

Typing a phrase works like ⌘K (parseFileCommands in packages/navigation/src/smart-file-commands.ts):

• "create track with Mave", "new track Starry Savior in Mave": a track, in that team.
• "add as version to Afterglow", "version of my latest track": versions on that track.
• "send transfer to Senator": Senator is looked up among the team's collaborators (by any name they go by, artist or real name, with a typo forgiven), people credited by name on the team's tracks, and the teams it reaches, contacts' teams included (GET /api/v1/transfers/recipients). Someone Aden has an email for is picked on Share by that email. Right after the transfer is made, Aden opens on its Send to teams or Share step. Several names work too ("to Senator and Jo", "to Kim, Sam & Jo"). People with such a team get the transfer on "Send to teams" with their teams picked (?sendTo=7,8); the rest on its share step with them picked (?share=Jo,Kim), right after. A name Aden doesn't know gets a sparkle on the right of the row: it sends the transfer and opens Share already looking up their published email (?find=true). You press Send; nothing is sent for you.
• "add to latest session", "add to session vocal takes": the audio as session recordings (the live session first, else the newest started).
• "put in team files for Mave", "airdrop", "add to Neon".

The same phrases work in ⌘K while files wait on the shelf: "send transfer to Senator" there opens the shelf and runs it on them. When nothing in the phrase is about the files, the shelf shows the palette's own rows (its create commands, then its pages) under "Open in Aden", built by the palette's builders (buildSmartCommandRows, getAllNavigationItems).

A file's right-click menu (and "…") on Home's Recent list is the same searchable menu as a chat's: the shelf's suggestions for that file come first (drop_shelf_preview plans it without putting it on the shelf), and typing reads a phrase with parseFileCommands. Picking one opens the shelf on the file and runs it there (drop_shelf_open_with).

A file's "…" in ⌘K is that searchable menu too: typing filters its actions and reads a phrase the same way, under "Drop zone" (components/drop-shelf/file-commands.tsx, shared with Recent).

A matched track shows its cover and status, a session whether it is live, another team its avatar. Every phrase is listed, run through the real parser, on /admin/capabilities under "Drop shelf".

Staying in step with ⌘K: the file parser reads phrases with ⌘K's VERBS and splitOn; every run kind is listed in SMART_FILE_RUN_KINDS (the build breaks when one is missing) and needs an example (the test fails without one); the desktop runs them through an exhaustive switch, so a new kind is a type error until it can run.

The team chip left of the notch switches the app's active team, or Personal. From Personal, an action that lands in a team asks which one.

Files on the shelf drag back out, one card or row, or the whole stack: it works as a clipboard, and they stay on it.

Recent. The clock beside Open in Aden lists what the shelf did lately, newest first. Click a row to open what it made; a transfer's link copies again. Kept on this computer only, the last 30.

Without a notch

• On any Mac, drop files on the Aden icon in the menu bar.
• On Windows, drag a file toward the top centre of the screen.
• On Mac and Windows, right-click files and choose Aden – Choose Action….
• In Aden's search (⌘K), type drop and choose "Drop files into Aden".

Turn the notch off in Settings > System > Drop files on the notch.