SMF·TIMING
Can a prompt replace Timing?
Time tracking — automatic tracking on the Mac
Exhibit tracking slip
Verdict
Capture what you did, then let readable rules file it: window title contains "Henderson" means the Henderson project, this application means admin. Every part of that runs locally with no key and no service, which makes it a yes in a sitting. The confidence is medium because Timing's edge is depth of native capture — which document, which browser tab, which call — and a homemade version sees less than the paid one does.
Exhibit A — The prompt
Received on31.07.2026Build an automatic time tracker whose rules are readable and auditable.
Stack: a local recorder plus a dashboard, SQLite, no network calls. Consider building on an existing open-source capture layer rather than writing OS hooks yourself.
Capture: active application, window title, document path where the OS exposes one, and input activity, run-length compacted.
The rule engine is the product:
- A rule has a matcher (application equals, window title contains, title matches a regular expression, document path starts with), a target project, and a position in an ordered list. First match wins.
- Every assigned block records **which rule matched**, shown in the UI. An unexplained assignment is the thing that makes people stop trusting an automatic tracker.
- A "why is this unassigned" screen lists the biggest unassigned blocks by total time, most first, with a one-click "create a rule from this window title" that prefills a sensible matcher.
- Rule changes are not retroactive by default. Offer an explicit "re-apply rules to the last N days" action that shows how many blocks would change before running, because silently rewriting last month's timesheet is a way to lose an invoice dispute.
Projects with a billable flag and an hourly rate, a day timeline, a week summary by project, and CSV export including the matching rule for every row.
Manual override: any block can be reassigned by hand, and a manual assignment is never overwritten by a later rule run. Mark it visibly as manual.
Privacy: pause control showing paused time as paused, per-application title redaction, raw-sample retention window, and a wipe command.
Write tests for first-match-wins ordering, for manual assignments surviving a rule re-run, and for the retroactive preview counting correctly.
Do not build cloud sync, a mobile app, or third-party task integrations.Opening prefills the prompt — press enter to run it.
Exhibit B — What you lose
- B.1 depth of capture — the specific document, tab or call, not just the application
- B.2 the iOS companion and imported phone-call time
- B.3 integrations that pull task names from ClickUp, Linear or a calendar
- B.4 a signed, notarised Mac application
- B.5 somebody fixing capture when a macOS update changes the permissions
Prior art
Exhibit C — Why people still pay: native capture depth on macOS
Because rules are only as good as what they can match on, and Timing sees more than a homemade recorder does. Depth of capture is the product; the rule engine is the demo.
Questions
Why show which rule matched?
Because the failure mode of automatic tracking is a block filed under the wrong project with no explanation, and the user's only recourse is to distrust everything. Naming the rule turns that into a two-second fix.
Why are rule changes not retroactive by default?
Because a timesheet you already invoiced against should not change when you tidy up a rule. The explicit re-apply action, with a preview of how many blocks move, keeps that a decision rather than a side effect.
How much capture depth do you actually lose?
On macOS a homemade recorder reliably gets the application and the window title; it gets the open document only for applications that expose it, and it gets browser tabs only with a browser extension. That gap is most of what the licence buys.
Does Timing let me export my history?
Yes — time entries and projects export as CSV, and the raw activity is in a local database you can read. It is one of the more portable tools here, largely because it never sent your data anywhere in the first place.
Related tools
Receipt