Day Journal

You start the journal on Today (or Capture → Open Day Journal, ⌘N), choose what it keeps in Settings → Daily history, and find finished days in Timeline.

While it runs, Everpaper keeps a private record of your workday. In the default mode, Screen history, it takes a screenshot of each display every 2 minutes, reads the text on screen so you can find anything you saw, and writes the day up when you stop.

Start your workday journal#

On Today, press Start workday journal. In Screen history or Detailed screen history, macOS first needs Screen Recording. Press Open Settings and turn Everpaper on under System Settings → Privacy & Security → Screen & System Audio Recording. If the switch doesn't respond, remove Everpaper with − and add it again with +, then relaunch Everpaper. Everpaper must be in your Applications folder for macOS to keep the grant. Activity only needs no permission.

While the journal runs 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 (⌘R). Discard throws the day away, after asking.

Choose what your day keeps#

Pick a mode in Settings → Daily history → History mode. Setup uses slightly different names; both are shown here.

Grant Accessibility for Detailed screen history in Settings → General → Mac permissions.

In every mode except Screen history you can also turn on Computer History, which records clicks, shortcuts and the text you select or type. It's off until you turn it on. See Computer History.

What gets captured#

• Screenshots (Screen history and Detailed screen history). An image of each whole display at the interval you choose: every 2 minutes by default, or 30 seconds, 1, 5 or 10 minutes (Screenshot every, shown in Screen history). It can include windows behind the one you're using. Apps you add under Settings → Privacy → Skip apps aren't captured while they're in front.
• On-screen text. Each screenshot is read on this Mac, so its text is searchable.
• Context. The app and window in front, so activities are easy to make sense of later.

Running notes and the day's entry#

Every 10 minutes by default (Settings → Daily history → Review new activity every: 10, 15, 30 or 60 minutes), your AI reviews what's new and adds to the day's running notes.

The end-of-day review#

Press Stop & Review (⌘R). Everpaper finishes its notes, then opens Here's the day on Today. Read the running notes, answer any questions, add notes for the day, and press Save Journal. (Discard deletes the whole day — its observations, screenshots and your answers — and can't be undone.)

On save, your AI writes the day's entry: a first-person diary of what you did, including any meetings you recorded that day. It appears as Day Summary on that day's page in Timeline. If no AI is set up, the day is still saved without an entry; once you set up AI, the day's page offers Write up this day. A day cut short by a crash or force-quit is written up automatically once Everpaper can.

During meetings#

While you record a meeting, the journal pauses on its own and resumes when the meeting ends. You can still mark moments. What was said in the meeting is included in that evening's entry. If you press Stop & Review while a meeting is still recording, your day is prepared while the meeting carries on.

Pausing capture#

Press Pause to stop capture for a while. You can note why with a quick reason — Meeting, Break, Lunch, Personal — or type your own. Press Resume to start again. The pause and its reason are recorded, so a finished day shows when and why capture stopped. The Everpaper menu-bar icon has Pause Journal and Resume Journal too.

Everpaper can also pause on its own:

• Pause when you’re away stops screenshots when you step away. It is on by default, after 2 minutes (or 30 seconds, 1 minute), and appears in Screen history.
• Reduce work on battery lightens capture and analysis on battery. Off by default.

Both are in Settings → Daily history → Capture schedule.

How long your days are kept#

Keep screenshots for (Settings → Daily history → How long it stays) deletes screenshots older than 30 days by default (or 7, 90 days, or Forever). In Detailed screen history the setting reads Keep checkpoints for; in Activity only and Focused fallback, Keep visual captures for. The same choice is also in Settings → Privacy → How long it stays, as Keep screenshot images for, with the switch below under Manage saved text… as Also delete expired text & recall data.

On a new install, Also delete their text & recall data is on. Past the same limit, Everpaper also deletes that day's recognized text, search data, running notes and written entry. Some of the day, such as the app timeline and the notes you typed in the review, can stay; to remove everything, delete the day. To keep your written days, turn that switch off or choose Forever before the limit passes. Deleted days can't be restored.

If you upgraded from an earlier build that already had journal data, the switch starts off and only images are removed. Meetings are not affected.

Today's focus#

Today's focus on the Today page suggests a few to-dos. Without AI it finds open loops (files or topics you touched, then dropped) and cooling threads (things that went quiet). With AI set up, it also pulls to-dos from your recent meetings and days, and turns the action items in your meeting results into tasks. These appear first.

You can check a to-do off, dismiss it, or press Add to Reminders. Each to-do becomes its own reminder in a Reminders list called Everpaper and stays open in Today. The first time, macOS asks for access to Reminders. View all tasks shows the full list.

Your finished days (Timeline)#

Finished days live in Timeline in the sidebar. Each page shows the Day Summary, what you did and when, your captures, and your notes. The side rail lists the day's Decisions and Commitments (with AI), people and projects, open threads, and your rhythm. Ask this day… answers questions about that day only. To remove a day, use Delete this day and all its evidence; you can undo it from Today right after.

Use ←/→ to turn pages and ⌘D to jump to a date. Ask the book (⌘F) at the top of Timeline searches across every day; see Recall.

Press ⌘L for 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.

The red ribbon at the top right, or ⌘T, always brings you back to Today.

Where your data is stored#

Your screenshots, text, timeline, entries and notes are stored on this Mac, in Everpaper's folder in your user Library. To keep a copy elsewhere, use Export.

Capture and text recognition happen on this Mac. Text leaves it only if you set up an AI that sends it, or let another AI app read your journal; see AI on your Mac.