Day Journal
Quiet on-device screenshots, on-device text recognition, an AI write-up of your day, and an end-of-day review — all kept on your Mac.
The Day Journal is today's page in your book. While it runs, Everpaper quietly takes a screenshot of your front window every couple of minutes, reads the text on screen so you can recall anything you saw, and — when you stop for the day — writes the day up for you to review and keep.
Start capturing
Open the Day Journal control on today's page and press Start. The first time, macOS needs the Screen Recording permission; grant it under System Settings → Privacy & Security → Screen Recording, then start again.
While capture is running you'll see:
- A RECORDING indicator with an elapsed clock.
- A running FRAMES count (screenshots taken so far).
- A MOMENTS count. Press Mark Moment to flag something worth remembering as it happens; you can add a short note to a moment, too.
To wrap up, press Stop & Review. Discard throws the session away.
What gets captured
- Screenshots. A frame of your front window, taken on-device at your chosen cadence. The default is every 2 minutes (you can pick 30 seconds, 1, 2, 5, or 10 minutes).
- On-screen text (OCR). Each frame is read on-device so its text is searchable and recallable. Recognition runs entirely on your Mac.
- Context. The app and window in front, so activities are easy to make sense of later.
Deep read (off by default)
Capture focused text (deep read) reads the focused window's text through Accessibility for richer recall. It's off by default, stays on-device, and runs through the same redaction gate as everything else. Turn it on under Settings → Capture if you want it.
The AI day narrative
As the day goes on, Everpaper periodically reviews the new screenshots and keeps a running summary of what you've been working on. The default is every 30 minutes (you can choose 15, 30, or 60). When you stop, that work becomes the day's narrative — a short, readable write-up that sits on the finished day's page alongside a timeline of your activities, the apps you used, your marked moments, and any notes you add.
The narrative is the one part that draws on an AI provider. Connect one under Settings → AI Provider — a local provider keeps everything on your Mac. Capture, text recognition, search, and storage never need a provider.
The end-of-day review
After Stop & Review, Everpaper writes up your day and then opens a short review at the foot of today's page. It's a chat: it shows the running summary, may ask a few follow-up questions to fill in gaps, and lets you add notes. When you're happy, keep the day; or discard it. A kept day is saved as a finished page you can turn back to anytime.
Any finished day also has Chat with this day — a free-form conversation about that single day, answered from what was captured.
Pausing capture
Press Pause during a session to stop new screenshots for a while. You can note why with a quick reason — Meeting, Break, Lunch, Personal — or type your own. Press Resume to start capturing again. The pause (and its reason) is recorded, so a finished day can show when and why capture was interrupted.
Everpaper can also pause on its own:
- Pause when idle stops capturing when you step away. On by default, after 2 minutes idle (you can choose 30 seconds, 1, or 2 minutes).
- Reduce work on battery lightens capture and analysis on battery power.
Both live under Settings → Capture.
Keeping and clearing screenshots
Screenshots are pruned automatically by the Keep screenshots for setting — 30 days by default, or 7, 90, or Forever. Lowering it deletes older captures on its next pass; "Forever" never auto-deletes.
Today's Focus
On the right side of today's page, Today's Focus surfaces a few suggested to-dos drawn from your patterns — no AI provider needed:
- Open loops — files or topics you touched then dropped ("Close
plan.md— you touched it 8 days ago and haven't been back"). - Cooling threads — things that went quiet ("Decide if the roadmap is still relevant").
- Meeting action items — bullets extracted from your meeting transcripts' "Action Items" sections.
You can check one off, dismiss it, or Add to Notes — which creates a checklist note in Apple Notes with one click. (The first time, macOS asks for Automation permission to control Notes; grant it once and it's automatic afterwards.)
When an AI provider is connected, the to-do titles are optionally rephrased into
clearer imperative voice ("Finish and close plan.md") — but the detection
itself is deterministic and always works, even offline.
Today's Focus refreshes when you open the page and after you finish a day's review.
The Day Index
Press ⌘L anywhere to open the Day Index — a chronological overview of every captured day, newest first. Each row shows the day's title, date, frame count, and a thumbnail of its most recent capture. Use ↑/↓ to move and Return to turn straight to a day. A density strip at the top shows how many days you've captured and the span of your history.
Turning through your days
Use the left and right arrows to turn between days. The red Ribbon always brings you back to today, and Turn to today is also available from the Index (⌘K, shortcut T).
Where your data is stored
Everything stays on this Mac, under your Library:
- Screenshots:
~/Library/Application Support/HindsightNext/journal - Journal database (text, timeline, narratives, notes):
~/Library/Application Support/HindsightNext/hindsight.db
Capture and text recognition happen on-device, and nothing leaves your Mac unless you choose to connect an AI provider for the narrative or for chat.