Timetrap is a simple command line time tracker written in ruby. It provides an easy to use command line interface for tracking what you spend your time on.
To install:
$ gem install timetrap
This will place a t executable in your path.
$ # get help
$ t --help
Timetrap maintains a list of timesheets.
$ # create the "coding" timesheet
$ t sheet coding
Switching to sheet coding
All commands can be abbreviated.
$ # same as "t sheet coding"
$ t s coding
Switching to sheet coding
Each timesheet contains entries. Each entry has a start and end time, and a note associated with it. An entry without an end time set is considered to be running.
You check in to the current sheet with the in command.
$ # check in with "document timetrap" note
$ t in document timetrap
Checked into sheet "coding".
Commands like display and now will show you the running entry.
$ t display
Timesheet: coding
Day Start End Duration Notes
Sun Nov 28, 2010 12:26:10 - 0:00:03 document timetrap
0:00:03
---------------------------------------------------------
Total 0:00:03
$ t now
*coding: 0:01:02 (document timetrap)
If you make a mistake use the edit command.
$ # edit the running entry's note
$ t edit writing readme
editing entry #42
You check out with the out command.
$ t out
Checked out of sheet "coding"
You can edit entries that aren't running using edit's --id or -i flag.
t display --ids (or t display -v) will tell you the ids.
$ # note id column in output
$ t d -v
Timesheet: coding
Id Day Start End Duration Notes
43 Sun Nov 28, 2010 12:26:10 - 13:41:03 1:14:53 writing readme
1:14:53
---------------------------------------------------------
Total 1:14:53
$ # -i43 to edit entry 43
$ t e -i43 --end "2010-11-28 13:45"
editing entry #43
$ t d
Timesheet: coding
Day Start End Duration Notes
Sun Nov 28, 2010 12:26:10 - 13:45:00 1:18:50 writing readme
1:18:50
---------------------------------------------------------
Total 1:18:50
Commands such as in, out, edit, and display have flags that accept
times as arguments. Any time you pass Timetrap a time it will try to parse it
as a natural language time.
This is very handy if you start working and forget to start Timetrap. You can
check in 5 minutes ago using in's --at flag.
$ t in --at "5 minutes ago"
Command line flags also have short versions.
$ # equivilent to the command above
$ t i -a "5 minutes ago"
You can consult the Chronic gem (http://chronic.rubyforge.org/) for a full list of parsable time formats, but all of these should work.
$ t out --at "in 30 minutes"
$ t edit --start "last monday at 10:30am"
$ t edit --end "tomorrow at noon"
$ t display --start "10am" --end "2pm"
$ t i -a "2010-11-29 12:30:00"
Timetrap has built-in support for 5 output formats.
These are text, csv, ical, json, and ids
The default is a plain text format. (You can change the default format using
t configure).
$ t display
Timesheet: coding
Day Start End Duration Notes
Mon Apr 13, 2009 15:46:51 - 17:03:50 1:16:59 improved display functionality
17:25:59 - 17:26:02 0:00:03
18:38:07 - 18:38:52 0:00:45 working on list
22:37:38 - 23:38:43 1:01:05 work on kill
2:18:52
Tue Apr 14, 2009 00:41:16 - 01:40:19 0:59:03 gem packaging
10:20:00 - 10:48:10 0:28:10 working on readme
1:27:13
---------------------------------------------------------
Total 3:46:05
The CSV formatters is easy to import into a spreadsheet.
$ t display --format csv
start,end,note,sheet
"2010-08-21 11:19:05","2010-08-21 12:12:04","migrated site","coding"
"2010-08-21 12:44:09","2010-08-21 12:48:46","DNS emails and install email packages","coding"
"2010-08-21 12:49:57","2010-08-21 13:10:12","A records","coding"
"2010-08-21 15:09:37","2010-08-21 16:32:26","setup for wiki","coding"
"2010-08-25 20:42:55","2010-08-25 21:41:49","rewrote index","coding"
"2010-08-29 15:44:39","2010-08-29 16:21:53","recaptcha","coding"
"2010-08-29 21:15:58","2010-08-29 21:30:31","backups","coding"
"2010-08-29 21:40:56","2010-08-29 22:32:26","backups","coding"
iCal format lets you get your time into your favorite calendar program (remember commands can be abbreviated).
$ t d -f ical > MyTimeSheet.ics
The ids formatter is provided to facilitate scripting within timetrap. It only outputs numeric id for the entries. This is handy if you want to move all entries from one sheet to another sheet. You could do something like this:
$ for id in `t display sheet1 -f ids`; do t edit --id $id --move sheet2; done
editing entry #36
editing entry #37
editing entry #44
editing entry #46
A json formatter is also provided, because hackers love json.
$ t d -fjson
Timetrap tries to make it easy to define custom output formats.
You're encouraged to submit these back to timetrap for inclusion in a future version.
To create a custom formatter you create a ruby class and implement two methods on it.
As an example we'll create a formatter that only outputs the notes from entries.
To ensure that timetrap can find your formatter put it in
~/.timetrap/formatters/notes.rb. The filename should be the same as the
string you will pass to t d --format to invoke it. If you want to put your
formatter in a different place you can run t configure and edit the
formatter_search_paths option.
All timetrap formatters live under the namespace Timetrap::Formatters so
define your class like this:
class Timetrap::Formatters::Notes
end
When t display is invoked, timetrap initializes a new instance of the
formatter passing it an Array of entries. It then calls #output which should
return a string to be printed to the screen.
This means we need to implement an #initialize method and an #output
method for the class. Something like this:
class Timetrap::Formatters::Notes
def initialize(entries)
@entries = entries
end
def output
@entries.map{|entry| entry[:note]}.join("\n")
end
end
Now when I invoke it:
$ t d -f notes
working on issue #123
working on issue #234
archive
Archives the selected entries (by moving them to a sheet called _[SHEET])
These entries can be seen by running t display _[SHEET].
usage: t archive [--start DATE] [--end DATE] [SHEET]
backend Run an interactive database session on the timetrap database. Requires the sqlite3 command.
usage: t backend
configure
Creates a config file at ~/.timetrap.yml or ENV['TIMETRAP_CONFIG_FILE'] if
one doesn't exist. If one does exist it will update it with new
configuration options preserving any user overrides. Prints path to config
file. This file may contain ERB.
usage: t configure
display
Display a given timesheet. If no timesheet is specified, show the current
timesheet. If all is passed as SHEET display all timesheets. Accepts
an optional --ids flag which will include the entries' ids in the output.
This is useful when editing an non running entry with edit.
Display is designed to support a variety of export formats that can be
specified by passing the --format flag. This currently defaults to
text. iCal, csv, json, and numeric id output are also supported.
Display also allows the use of a --round or -r flag which will round
all times in the output. See global options below.
usage: t display [--ids] [--round] [--start DATE] [--end DATE] [--format FMT] [SHEET | all]
edit
Inserts a note associated with the an entry in the timesheet, or edits the
start or end times. Defaults to the current time although an --id flag can
be passed with the entry's id (see display.)
usage: t edit [--id ID] [--start TIME] [--end TIME] [--append] [NOTES]
in
Start the timer for the current timesheet. Must be called before out. Notes
may be specified for this period. This is exactly equivalent to
t in; t edit NOTES. Accepts an optional --at flag.
usage: t in [--at TIME] [NOTES]
kill
Delete a timesheet or an entry. Entry's are referenced using an --id
flag (see display). Sheets are referenced by name.
usage: t kill [--id ID] [TIMESHEET]
list List the available timesheets.
usage: t list
now Print a description of all running entries.
usage: t now
out Stop the timer for the current timesheet. Must be called after in. Accepts an optional --at flag. Accepts an optional TIMESHEET name to check out of a running, non-current sheet.
usage: t out [--at TIME] [TIMESHEET]
resume Start the timer for the current timesheet with the same notes as the last entry. If there is no last entry the new one has blank notes ore uses the optional NOTES parameter.
usage: t resume [--at TIME] [NOTES]
sheet Switch to a timesheet creating it if necessary. The default timesheet is called "default". When no sheet is specified list all existing sheets.
usage: t sheet [TIMESHEET]
week Shortcut for display with start date set to monday of this week
usage: t week [--ids] [--end DATE] [--format FMT] [TIMESHEET | all]
rounding
passing a --round or -r flag to any command will round entry start
and end times to the closest 15 minute increment. This flag only affects the
display commands (e.g. display, list, week, etc.) and is non-destructive.
The actual start and end time stored by Timetrap are unaffected.
See configure command to change rounding increment from 15 minutes.
non-interactive
passing a --yes or -y flag will cause any command that requires
confirmation (such as kill) to assume an affirmative response to any
prompt. This is useful when timetrap is used in a scripted environment.
Configuration of TimeTrap's behavior can be done through an ERB interpolated YAML config file.
See t configure for details. Currently supported options are:
round_in_seconds: The duration of time to use for rounding with the -r flag
database_file: The file path of the sqlite database
append_notes_delimiter: delimiter used when appending notes via t edit --append
formatter_search_paths: an array of directories to search for user defined fomatter classes
default_formatter: The format to use when display is invoked without a --format option
The initial version of Timetrap was heavily inspired by Trevor Caira's Timebook, a small python utility.
Original Timebook available at: http://bitbucket.org/trevor/timebook/src/
Submit to http://github.com/samg/timetrap/issues