Daily use — Play / Pause

Day-to-day, ScreenJournal is as simple as pressing Play when you start work and Pause when you stop. This page walks through that flow and the small handful of things you can check on the tracker while it's running.

Starting your day

1. Open the ScreenJournal app from your menu bar (macOS) or system tray (Windows). If your org policy is set to auto-launch, it's already running.
2. If you signed out last time, sign back in.
3. Press ▶ Play.

You'll see the status switch to Recording. From here, just work normally — the tracker stays out of your way.

What "Recording" actually does

While the tracker is in the Recording state, it:

• Captures the contents of your screen for productivity analysis. Whether the video is saved or thrown away after analysis is decided by your org's recording mode.
• Logs which application or browser tab is in focus and for how long.
• Captures meeting audio only when a configured meeting app (Zoom, Meet, Teams, etc.) is in front and the microphone is active. Otherwise the microphone stays closed.
• Censors content automatically when it matches the org's sensitive-app rules (banking apps, HR tools, etc.).

Taking a break

Press ⏸ Pause to stop recording. The session ends cleanly: recorded segments upload, the tracker stops capturing the screen, and your manager's dashboard shows a gap for the paused period.

If your manager has enabled Force tracking to be on while the app is open, the Pause button is disabled. The only way to stop recording in that case is to quit the app — which may also be disabled by Force the app to always run. In that case, recording continues as long as the tracker is open.

A break doesn't have to mean Pause. You can just walk away — the tracker logs idle time automatically when there's no input or audio activity for a while, and shows it in the timeline as such.

Finishing your day

Two options:

• Press Pause and leave the app open. Tomorrow morning, press Play again.
• Quit the app (if your policy allows). It'll restart the next time you log in to your computer (or you launch it manually).

If your org has auto-resume on wake/restart enabled (the default), the tracker will pick up where it left off after a sleep or reboot — you don't have to remember to start it.

Status indicators

Click the tray / menu-bar icon any time to see:

• Current state — Idle, Recording, or Paused.
• Microphone status — a clear indicator (and a different icon) whenever audio is being captured for a meeting.
• Today's tracked time so far — a rough total.
• Local storage used — how much disk the tracker is using.

Your own view of your activity

You don't only get tracked — you can also see your own data:

1. Open the ScreenJournal web app (you may already be signed in).
2. Open Activity in the sidebar.
3. You'll see your own timeline and your weekly ranking position.

Use this to spot-check what the AI thinks you did. If a segment is mis-scored, your manager can record a timeline correction that teaches the AI for next time.

Small things to know

• Sleeping the machine pauses recording cleanly. Waking it up resumes if auto-resume is enabled.
• Switching Wi-Fi networks is fine — uploads pause and resume automatically.
• Going offline is fine for short periods — the tracker buffers locally up to your org's retention limits.
• Closing your laptop lid counts as sleep; it does not lose state.