I hope the permission I got the last time to post about this app still applies, if not, please do let me know!
I’d like to introduce my app which I have been working on for about half a year, it’s called Baby Journal and it’s an end-to-end encrypted app for tracking your baby activities, like feeding, diaper changes and so on.
On iOS you can install it to your homescreen as a webapp, on Android you can either install it as a webapp or directly from Google Play. On both you can just run it from your browser. Neither has any advantage over the other, the content will be the same.
Links:
- baby-journal.app - the (optionally installable) webapp
- Google Play Store
- Backend source code
- App source code
Now onto the app itself!
The biggest feature is that it’s entirely end to end encrypted and I as the server operator have no access to your unencrypted data. I’m of the opinion that the privacy of your kids should not be compromised for some company to make a quick buck.
What activities can the app track?
- feeding tracking - nursing (left and right breast separately), bottle, solid foods
- diaper changes - wet, poopy or both, you can also select the color and amount
- breast pumping - left and right breast separately
- sleeping
- temperature taking
- weight
- length
- milestones - with cute descriptions!
- with ability to add custom milestones
And some cool features!
- tracker - just hit start on your activity and let the app count how long it takes
- multiple babies - if you have more than one bundle of joy, you can switch between them easily
- sharing with multiple other accounts - you can easily share your data with as many people as you want without compromising privacy
- shared tracking - if you use the app with multiple people, you can enable shared tracking - start tracking on one device, finish tracking on another
- data at a quick glance - on the main screen you can see when was your baby fed for the last time, when they had a diaper changed and so on
- various fine-tune settings - do you want to calculate the time since last feeding since the beginning of the feeding or since the end? Do you want to ignore small gaps between multiple feedings (for example 10 minutes while you switch from nursing to bottle) as one feeding session? Does water count as feeding? All configurable!
- daily summary - you can get a nice summary where you can see all the important data in a concise format
Currently the data can only be tracked in metric units, but imperial support is coming.
Note that the encrypted nature has one downside - if you don’t export your account code and lose access to the app (for example your device breaks), there’s no way to recover your account. I advise you to securely store your account code as soon as possible.
For advanced users there’s also a self-hosting option! You can run your own backend and app. Or you can just run your own backend and point the official app to it. Currently there’s not much documentation on how to do that, but if you need that, I can write something up.
Do let me know if you have any questions!
Though not of use to me, I always applaud open source/ no tracking solutions.
May I ask what your motivation was?
I’m guessing having a baby
Or their experience with having been a baby.
Got a baby, wanted some app like that, all of them were either horrible or ridden with trackers.
So I took a look as I’m always looking for good FOSS alternatives to apps that I use. I’m super stoked about this app! I don’t have a baby to track anymore, but we are planning on kid #2, and an app that doesn’t require anything is a plus.
The first thing I see that you might want to change is that the button to start/stop the feeding timer needs to be big. Like really fucking big. When I was nursing I was starting my timer one-handed and I have small hands as it is. My kid also wasn’t the best at nursing, so I’d often spend a lot of time in the beginning getting him positioned/latched. I could see the “small” button being a problem.
I’ll consider it, thanks for the info!
I’m gonna be a dad in February. I’ll check it out!
Congrats!
🥳
Why do you need a backend to store simple data? A simple offline app and a web site with screenshots would be more interesting.
Also your web site is changing history and I can’t use the back button, it’s annoying.
Because you can’t share the data with multiple people. It’s changing history because it’s a web app, not a web site.
Thanks for putting this together. I’ve just had my first and will be checking this out
Great app! Especially like the timer from last feeding, diaper etc. Would it be possible to institute an alarm / notification after a certain time [set by the user] as a sort of reminder tool?
Thanks! What kind of alarm do you have in mind? Like, you set you want to change a diaper every 3 hours and it should send a notification?
Yea exactly! The user sets an interval and then the app sends a push notification saying ‘its been x hours since last feeding’ or diaper change etc. Ideally can choose ringtone, vibrate or of its just a regular notification and it would be available for specifically recurring activities (feeding, diaper change, sleeping and pumping).
Also an option to record in imperial units (ounces) would be great too!
It appears that the home screen doesn’t refresh upon adding an entry also. Have to toggle to a different view and come back for the timer and summary to refresh. Ideally it would update immediately.
