Show HN: baseline – a free, open-source journaling and mood tracking app (opens in new tab)

I used to consistently journal on Day One. That period of time was arguably the most retrospective and emotionally accepting period of my life… until I stopped. Turns out, I would often return to previous days’ logs to augment, modify, and rephrase what I wrote…

This is a bad habit I noticed in myself. Because hindsight would cause me to rationalize to myself: “I don’t believe that’s how I felt 2 days ago, so let me reword it more positively.”

Coincidentally(?), I saw OP’s post on reddit a while ago, and back then I noticed something interesting about Baseline: its acknowledgement that my mood is a momentary snapshot of how I feel about that day, and how its design philosophy encourages me to be completely honest about my feelings.

Most mood journaling app allows me to go back and edit previous entries. But Baseline does not, and I think this is an underrated feature.

Use a notebook and a pen, make it a nice pen, and it can become a meditative / reflective moment , no concerns on who’s tracking your thoughts , security is all yours , and short of tearing out pages or something similar , it’s fixed, if you’re writing is bad enough, nobody can read it anyway !!

Looks pretty interesting. Can you log and track more than just mood? I used to use Nomie, and now use Bearable for something similar. Having an open source alternative would be really awesome.

Also, small feedback - it took a while to find the link to the projects github. It should probably be on the main page somewhere?

I've never successfully established a journaling habit. I'm giving it another try with your app. Maybe if I don't have the motivation to write I'll at least take a photo to keep the habit going. I really like the discreet mood. Having the Gap Fund is impressive. Well done. Good luck!

> 100% free & private.

free as in beer or freedom? How do you plan to monetize?