Why I Built a 200-Line Journaling CLI

07 Oct, 2025

Every productivity guru says, "journal daily." I tried Notion, Day One, Obsidian, pen and paper. Nothing stuck. Then I realized: I don't need another app. I need less friction.

The Problem:

• Desktop apps: requires context switching
• Web apps: requires internet, accounts, privacy concerns
• Pen and paper: can't search, can't sync
• Obsidian/Roam: too many features, too much setup

The Solution: A CLI tool that does ONE thing well:

• Lives in your terminal (you're already there)
• Uses your preferred editor (you already know it)
• Stores in git (you already use it)
• Zero configuration (just works)

How It Works:

$ journal
# Opens today's entry
# Edit, save, close
# Commits if changed
# Done.

The Result:

• 100+ consecutive days of journaling
• ~50KB total (just text files)
• Searchable with grep
• Synced across 3 machines
• Zero maintenance

Key Insight: The best productivity tool is the one you actually use. For developers, that means:

• Terminal-native
• Git-based
• Editor-agnostic
• No accounts, no cloud service, no subscription