
Ask HN: How can I analyze my own browsing behavior with only local tools? - rambojazz
How can I analyze and make statistics of my own web browsing behavior using only local software, and without giving out my personal browsing history to any 3rd party?
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firebones
On OSX, I wrote an installable startup daemon that logs the current window,
and for browsers, captures the URL from the address bar, and logs it to a
file. The sampling can be whatever period you decide, but you have to write
your own analytics. I haven't made it generally available, but it was a pretty
quick project to capture the basic data.

Here's the basic outline:

* Bash script that uses lsappinfo front to figure out what has focus * log the time, the app name, and other useful data

* If the current app is a browser, then branch on the browser type and "return URL of" the front tab or current document depending on the browser

* Echo whatever you want to capture to STDOUT

Then write up a startup .plist file to install and log the output.

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kalmi10
[https://timingapp.com](https://timingapp.com) seems to fit the bill, it’s a
local app for os x with optional sync capabilities

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dyeje
I used the free trial when it first came out, it's pretty slick.

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adkwo
I use [https://github.com/Naereen/uLogMe](https://github.com/Naereen/uLogMe)
(it's a fork of a tool Andrej Karpathy wrote a few years ago:
[http://karpathy.github.io/2014/08/03/quantifying-
productivit...](http://karpathy.github.io/2014/08/03/quantifying-
productivity)). It collects data on your general computer usage by measuring
the active time and amount of keystrokes per window. It has two parts: some
scripts to collect the data and a web interface to visualize the data.

The main drawback of such tools is that most ot them seem to require X11 and
won't work with wayland.

Similar tools:
[https://github.com/ActivityWatch](https://github.com/ActivityWatch)
[https://flowdash.co](https://flowdash.co)

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sprobertson
If you use Firefox, there's a local file called places.sqlite that stores
history, queries, bookmarks, etc.:
[http://kb.mozillazine.org/Places.sqlite](http://kb.mozillazine.org/Places.sqlite)

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hedgew
ManicTime and Leechblock are two solutions that work entirely locally, on
Windows.

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rambojazz
Edit: I meant with _free /opensource software_ and possibly on linux.

