Hourtrail help

Getting started

The first time Hourtrail starts, a short tour shows what it records and what it never records, lets you choose whether to track window titles and sites, and lets you add a few projects. You can change all of this later in Settings.

Hourtrail lives in the notification area (the tray), near the clock. Click its icon to see today's tracked time, Pause tracking, switch on Private mode, Add entry or Open Hourtrail. Right-click it for Pause, Private mode, Add manual entry…, Open, Settings, About / License and Quit.

If the icon is hidden under the ^ arrow, drag it onto the taskbar so it is always visible.

Assigning time to projects

There are three ways to put time on a project:

• On the timeline: drag across a range, or click a block, then choose Assign to project….
• On Today: drag activity from the Unassigned list onto a project, or use the buttons on each row.
• With rules: on the Rules page, choose New rule, then "If [window title, app or site] [contains, is, starts with or ends with] [text]" and a project. The preview shows what the rule will cover before you save it.

Rules apply to past and future activity. The first rule that matches wins, so order matters: Alt+Up and Alt+Down move the focused rule. Anything you assign by hand always beats rules. Hourtrail also suggests rules from your biggest unassigned time.

Use Add manual entry for time away from the PC, like a meeting. A manual entry replaces any tracked time it overlaps, so nothing is counted twice.

Reports and timesheets

The Reports page shows a day, week, month or custom range, with totals by project, app and site, a chart by day, and productive, neutral and distracting time. Set an app's or site's category in Settings › Categories; a site's category beats its browser's.

Under Export a timesheet, pick projects, dates and rounding (none, 6 or 15 minutes, to the nearest or up), then Export CSV… or Export PDF…. Rounding applies per day and project, and the total is the sum of the rounded rows.

Settings › General sets your working hours, the first day of the week and an optional end-of-day summary notification.

What counts as active

• Idle: after 5 minutes with no keyboard or mouse input (change it in Settings › General), the time since your last input isn't counted.
• Locked, asleep or signed out is never counted.
• Calls: with Count calls as active on (the default), a call in a known call app or meeting site still counts while you aren't typing.
• Media: turn on Count playing media as active to count time while an app keeps the screen on, like a video or presentation.
• Pause for 15 minutes, 1 hour or until resumed. Hourtrail tells you when tracking resumes.

Privacy controls

In Settings › Tracking:

• Track window titles off keeps only app names.
• Track browser sites off stops reading browser address bars. When on, only the domain (like github.com) is kept.
• Never track these apps and Never track these sites record nothing at all while one is in front. Sites include their subdomains.
• Keep activity deletes older activity automatically after 1 year or 90 days.

Private mode (Ctrl+Alt+I) counts time but keeps titles and sites out. Private and incognito browser windows are tracked like any other window, so switch it on for those.

In Settings › Data you can Export all data as a JSON file, Delete a date range, or Delete all data.

If a browser's sites don't appear

Hourtrail reads the address bar of Edge, Chrome, Brave, Vivaldi, Opera and Firefox through Windows accessibility, so no extension is needed.

1. Update the browser.
2. In Firefox, open Settings › Privacy & Security › Permissions and make sure Prevent accessibility services from accessing your browser is off, then restart Firefox.

Keyboard shortcuts

These work from anywhere in Windows while Hourtrail is running.

Trial and license

Hourtrail is free to try for 14 days, with everything turned on. After that: Tracking keeps going. The timeline, reports and CSV/PDF exports cover the last 7 days, and Export all data always exports everything.

Entering your license key

1. Buy a license. Your key appears on screen as soon as the payment goes through, and arrives by email.
2. In Hourtrail, open the License page in Settings.
3. Paste the key and choose Activate. The PC needs to be online for this step.

Using it on more than one PC

One key works on up to 3 PCs. To move it to a new PC, deactivate it on the old one from the License page first. If the old PC is gone, free up its place at Manage devices, using the email address you bought with or the key itself.

Once activated, Hourtrail works offline. When it's online it checks the license about once a week, so a refunded or revoked key stops working on its next check.

Bought Hourtrail in the Microsoft Store? The Store edition is licensed through your Microsoft account instead, and doesn't use a key.

Updates

To get the latest version, choose Check for updates in Hourtrail. It asks before installing anything.

Each update is checked against a fingerprint (SHA-256) before it runs, and installs over the current version without touching your data. Updates for the Microsoft Store edition come through the Store.

See what’s new in each version.

Your data and uninstalling

Hourtrail keeps its settings and data on your PC, in this folder (paste it into File Explorer’s address bar to open it):

%LOCALAPPDATA%\Hedgerow\Hourtrail

To back it up, quit Hourtrail and copy that folder.

To uninstall, open Windows Settings › Apps › Installed apps, find Hourtrail and choose Uninstall. The uninstaller asks whether to remove your data too.

Still stuck?

Email support@hedgerowapps.com and we’ll get back to you. Mention your Hourtrail version (shown in Settings › About) and your Windows version. More answers are on the support page.