A terminal-based electronic lab notebook/bullet journal written in Rust for users that want to keep a record of what they are doing, when they are doing it, and want to be able to store this securely in silica. It automatically stores entries and tasks with a timestamp in a JSON file that lives in a separate Git repository (so your data can be private while the program repo stays public). The UI is text-based (ratatui + crossterm) and divided into four quadrants you navigate with Tab / Shift+Tab.

• Terminal UI split into 4 quadrants:

  • ENTRY (top-right) — type or paste text. Enter submits, Shift+Enter inserts newline.
  • TASKS (top-left) — tasks created by starting an entry with *. Select and press Enter to mark done (idempotent: only first Enter marks it done and adds a DONE: journal entry).
  • SEARCH (bottom-left) — search by words, comma-separated terms, or date YYYY_MM_DD. Press Enter with input to run a search; clear input and press Enter to open a selected result.
  • CATALOGUE (bottom-right) — shows today’s entries (reverse chronological).

• Keyboard-first navigation:

  • Tab → advance focus (counter-clockwise): ENTRY -> TASKS -> SEARCH -> JOURNAL -> ENTRY ...
  • Shift+Tab → previous focus
  • Up / Down arrows → scroll within focused quadrant (where applicable)
  • Enter / Shift+Enter rules documented above
  • Ctrl+C → quit
  • Ctrl+G in SEARCH → run search (alternate)

• One automatic Clock-in / Clock-out entry on startup (created once per day):

  • CLOCK_IN_TIME = now
  • CLOCK_OUT_TIME = CLOCK_IN_TIME plus your work hours (currently + 9 hours on Monday/Tuesday, else +8 hours for a 42 hr work week)
  • Entry text: Clock-in: {CLOCK_IN_TIME}, Clock-out: {CLOCK_OUT_TIME}
  • This entry is created only once per day (if present, program won’t duplicate it).

• Each entry & task saved to JSON file, which is committed (and pushed) to a separate Git repository. New entries generate an automated commit.

• Entries and tasks have tags (used for searching); session LOCATION (entered at startup) is stored as a tag — not appended to visible text.

• Backwards-compatible JSON deserialization: older JSON files without tags load correctly.

• The program attempts a best-effort commit & push using the credentials posted at the top of the script. If you do not want the program to push, toggle COMMIT_AND_PUSH in the source.

• The program will try to interpret configured repo paths to be absolute (it expands ~ and converts ./Users/... / Users/... to /Users/...). See Configuration below.

Prerequisites:

• Rust toolchain (rustup/cargo). Cargo edition 2024, so Rust 1.85+.
• (Optional) git and network/SSH credentials if you enable push.

Steps:

# clone the program repository
git clone https://github.com/chasenunez/pro_logue.git
cd pro_logue

# build
cargo build --release

# run
cargo run --release

On startup, the app will ask for LOCATION: in the terminal — type a short label and press Enter. The program will use that value as a tag added to new entries and tasks created during the session. This allows you to later search for all the entries you have made at a specific location.

Open src/main.rs. At the top of the file you will find configuration constants; the most important ones:

const GIT_REPO_PATH: &str = "/Users/you/path/to/private_journal_repo/";
const DATA_FILE_NAME: &str = "journal.json";
const COMMIT_AND_PUSH: bool = true; // set false to disable committing/pushing
const AUTHOR_NAME: &str = "Your Name";
const AUTHOR_EMAIL: &str = "you@example.com";
const GIT_REMOTE_NAME: &str = "origin";
const GIT_BRANCH: &str = "main";

Important: GIT_REPO_PATH must resolve to an absolute path outside your program repo. The program performs path normalization (expands ~ and converts ./Users/... or Users/... into /Users/...) so the directory you configure is used directly at the filesystem root.

If the target directory does not exist the program will attempt to create it.

To disable pushing to remote, set COMMIT_AND_PUSH to false; the program will still write and commit locally (if you want to disable commits as well, you can further modify the git_commit_and_push function).

journal.json is a simple JSON file with two top-level keys:

{
  "journal": {
    "2025_12_18": [
      { "time": "09:00", "text": "Clock-in: 09:00, Clock-out: 17:00", "tags": ["EAWAG"] },
      { "time": "10:45", "text": "Met with team...", "tags": [] }
    ]
  },
  "tasks": [
    { "id": 1, "text": "Fix bug", "created_at": "2025-12-18T10:00:00", "completed_at": null, "tags": ["EAWAG"] }
  ]
}

Notes:

• tags is a list of strings and is used for searching. The program is backwards-compatible with older files that did not include tags thanks to serde defaults.
• Clock entries and DONE journal lines are plain text entries by default; if you want more structured clock entries we can change the schema later.

Contributions welcome. If you want to:

• Add unit tests,
• Convert the app into a multi-file crate,
• Add an explicit configuration file instead of compile-time constants,
• Make the clock entry structured (JSON object),
• Or add a help overlay and theming,

open a PR or an issue describing the change. Please follow Rust's idioms and keep changes minimal and well-documented.

All of the code in this repository is shared under the GPL-3.0 license.