How do I log my chat hours?

September 4, 2008 9:31 AM

How do I log the hours I'm logged in to Google chat?

I'd like to know when I'm logged in to Google chat, for records. Is there any software that can keep a log for me? (I use Adium on a Mac.)

posted by inactivist to computers & internet (6 comments total)

See this page for message logs/transcript information while using Adium:
http://trac.adiumx.com/wiki/MessageHistory

If you use GTalk right in your browser, a log will appear in your chat history if you have that feature enabled in your Settings.

If you just want to know how to know when you are actually logged in - not necessarily chatting - this I believe is much more difficult. It might be possible to write an Automator script that will start a timer and start Adium, and then stop the timer and write to a txt file your time logged in.
posted by brandoniain at 9:38 AM on September 4, 2008

I need to know when I'm logged in, and unfortunately I don't use it out of my browser. (Adium already saves chat transcripts, that's not what I need.)
posted by inactivist at 9:55 AM on September 4, 2008

Does Adium have a log for status changes? I know some IM clients (like Pidgin) allow you to log your contacts status changes (and online/offline events), you could always either add yourself as a contact, or create a second account on a different machine, then add yourself and let it do the logging.
posted by blue_beetle at 11:09 AM on September 4, 2008

I'm not sure if this'll work, but is there a way to get growl to log this? Expanding on blue_beetle's idea, you'd add yourself as a contact, adium would tell growl that you've logged on, and growl...emails you when you've logged on & off, maybe? Not sure how powerful growl is. There may be a way to do this with quicksilver, using the growl plugin for it?
posted by Lemurrhea at 11:13 AM on September 4, 2008

If you start an ichat with yourself, and then leave that window open, it will record when you sign in and out.
posted by bonaldi at 11:34 AM on September 4, 2008

It is pretty simple to write an Automator script, as suggested above, that will do this. It's surprisingly easy to use so if you're willing to roll up your sleeves and spend one or two hours digging around in Automator you can make this work.
posted by Electrius at 2:32 PM on September 4, 2008