Install once. It runs from then on.
One command. A local daemon with autostart, hooks into the agent CLIs you already use, and an optional skill for later.
Launch your agent from a new terminal after installing so the configured environment variables take effect. In VS Code, restart every open window.
Works with
Three steps, then it runs itself
No change to how you already work.
01
Install
One command. traceknot hooks into the agent CLIs you already have installed and starts a local daemon.
02
It pauses your first prompt
A hook holds each session there until you claim a work item or skip — no separate step to remember.
03
Runs in the background from then on
Autostart keeps the daemon running at login, so usage tracking doesn't depend on you remembering to open anything.
The hooks are what make it a guardrail
Install wires a small hook into each agent CLI you select. It runs early in every session and holds things there — up to 240 seconds — until you name the work item or skip. Nothing about how you run the agent changes; the pause is the only difference you'll notice.
Choose per agent
The Hooks group in the traceknot menu lets you turn the session hook on or off for each agent CLI individually.
Skip is a real option
If a session genuinely isn't for a tracked work item, dismiss the picker and traceknot moves on — it never blocks you indefinitely.
Runs in the background, not just when you remember
traceknot is a small daemon, not a foreground app. Once installed it can start automatically at login, so it's already listening the moment a hook fires — usage tracking doesn't depend on you opening anything first.
Server tab
An On/Off toggle for the daemon itself, and a separate On/Off toggle for starting it automatically on login.
Nothing to remember
Once autostart is on, every future session is covered from the first hook call — no step where tracking silently gets skipped.
Everything the daemon collects goes straight to a local SQLite database — seewhat it actually tracks.
One more thing you can turn on: the analysis skill
The Skill group in the same menu installs traceknot-analyze for the agents you pick. It lets the agent export and read its own session telemetry when you ask it to — nothing runs automatically, and it's off until you enable it.
Reconfigure or remove it anytime
Uninstalling keeps ~/.traceknot in place, so reinstalling doesn't lose your history. Delete that folder yourself if you want the data gone too.