Your editor saves files. Temporal.ist turns them into hours.
Point each project at its repository, keep coding, and your sessions write themselves: per project, per task, with the files you touched. No timer, no plugin, no screenshots.
Folders
on this computer~/work/halden-siteWatching~/work/halden-site/node_modulesIgnored
Websites
in your browserhttps://github.com/halden-studio/*Rule 1*://*.figma.com/design/*Rule 2
Saving a file in the folder, or opening a page that matches a rule, starts a session on this project. It ends 15 minutes after the last save, or when the last matching tab closes.
Made for the way you already work
Any editor, any language
It watches files, not editors. Several repositories can feed one project.
A real terminal client
Timers, tasks, history and a dashboard from your shell, with a background service.
Remote boxes too
Track work on servers and development machines over SSH, with no desktop needed.
Your coding agent knows
Claude Code, Codex, Gemini CLI, Copilot, Kimi and OpenCode can log and report time over MCP.
An API
A REST API with personal keys, documented from its own schema.
Webhooks
Signed events when projects and sessions are created, sessions close, and invoices are created or paid.
Set up a server in a minute
The installer picks the right build, checks its checksum and puts temporal in ~/.local/bin.
curl -fsSL https://temporal.ist/install.sh | shtemporal login
temporal watch add "Payments API" ~/code/payments-api
temporal daemon installAsk your coding agent
Connect Temporal.ist to the agent you already use and let it handle the bookkeeping while you stay in the terminal.
- Log a call you forgot, or fix yesterday's sessions, in one sentence
- Ask how long a feature took, per task
- Connect your assistant
Add 45 minutes for the Mapleworks kickoff call this afternoon, from half past one.
add_time_entry
Kickoff call
Done: 45 minutes on Onboarding flow for Mapleworks, today 13:30 to 14:15.
How long did I work on the Halden site this week?
get_time_report
11 hours 49 minutes since Monday, 4 hours 39 of them today.
Questions
Does it need a plugin for my editor?
No. Temporal.ist watches the files in your project folders, so it works the same in VS Code, JetBrains IDEs, Vim, Emacs, Zed or anything else that saves files.
Will builds and dependency installs count as work?
Folders such as .git and node_modules are ignored by default. Exclude your build output or other generated folders per project, so only your own changes count.
Can I track work on a remote server?
Yes. The terminal client runs on Linux servers (64-bit x86 and ARM64), signs in with a QR code and runs as a systemd service. Its time lands in the same account as your laptop's.
Is my code uploaded?
Never. Only the names of changed files within your watched folders, how often they changed and when, so you can see what a session was about.
Let your work keep its own time
Start on the free plan: no card and no trial period. Install the desktop app or the browser extension, choose what belongs to each project, and keep working.