Writing Streak Tracker

WHAT IT DOES

Writing Streak Tracker is a browser extension that monitors your typing activity across any textarea or input field and tracks your daily writing streaks. It records the date of each day when you type a minimum word count (configurable, default 50 words) and displays a comprehensive dashboard showing your current streak, longest streak, total writing days, and today's word count. A visual calendar grid with colored days shows your writing activity over the last 90 days at a glance. The tool is ideal for writers, students, bloggers, and anyone who wants to build a consistent writing habit and stay motivated by visualizing their progress.

WHERE IT RUNS

Writing Streak Tracker works on any webpage that contains text inputs, textareas, or content-editable elements. It runs locally in your browser as a lightweight userscript, monitoring typing events across the entire page. It works on writing platforms, social media, email clients, content management systems, note-taking apps, code editors, and any other page where text is entered. The tool handles static pages, dynamically loaded content via AJAX, and single-page applications where input fields appear and disappear without page reloads. All streak data is stored locally using GM_setValue—no text or writing content is ever sent to any server.

HOW TO USE

After installation, open the floating panel by clicking the extension icon. The panel displays your current streak, longest streak, total writing days, and today's word count with a progress indicator. A calendar grid shows the last 90 days, with each day colored based on your word count: green for meeting your daily goal, dark for partial writing, and transparent for no activity. Use the "Daily goal" input to set your target word count (default 50) and click Set to update it. Toggle the "Enable tracking" checkbox to pause or resume tracking without losing data. Click "Reset All Data" to clear your streak history (confirmation required). All data is saved automatically as you type.

REAL MECHANISM — WHY THIS WORKS

Most habit trackers require manual check-ins or are separate applications that cannot automatically detect writing activity on the web. Writing Streak Tracker uses a DOM-event-driven approach that automatically detects when you type in any input field. The tool attaches input event listeners to all text inputs, textareas, and content-editable elements on the page. When you type, the tool extracts the text content and counts the total number of words using a whitespace-splitting algorithm. With a debounce mechanism to avoid excessive saves, the tool updates the daily word count in local storage, keyed by the current date in YYYY-MM-DD format. To calculate streaks, the tool queries the stored data and iterates backward from today, counting consecutive days where the word count meets or exceeds the daily goal. The calendar grid is generated by building a 90-day view, coloring each day based on its word count relative to the daily goal. The tool also uses a MutationObserver to detect dynamically added input fields, ensuring that new fields are automatically tracked without requiring a page refresh. This approach ensures accurate, automatic, and fully private writing streak tracking without requiring any manual data entry or external services.

THE PANEL

The floating panel is fully draggable and remembers its position per site, snapping to the edges of the viewport when dragged near them. You can collapse the panel to a small icon to minimize screen distraction and expand it back with a single click. The panel is resizable from the bottom-right corner, giving you more space to view stats and the calendar. Press the Escape key to close the panel instantly. The panel remains open across page navigation within the same domain, maintaining your current view state. All preferences—panel position, daily goal, and tracking toggle state—are saved globally for a seamless experience.

PLEASE NOTE

Writing Streak Tracker requires the free BotGentz extension to be installed and enabled, as it relies on the cross-extension messaging API provided by BotGentz for DOM access permissions. Because websites frequently update their structure, input detection may require periodic script updates to maintain compatibility with specific sites. If the tool does not detect typing as expected, please check for updates or report the issue. All streak data is stored locally in your browser using GM_setValue. No writing content, word counts, or usage data are ever sent to any server. The extension does not read, store, or transmit any personal information. It only reads keystroke events to count words and stores aggregate word counts per day at your explicit request.