⏳ Terminal Time Machine
Never lose a terminal command or its output again.
A powerful VS Code extension that automatically monitors all your terminals, intelligently captures commands + full output, and lets you search, replay, analyze, and export your entire terminal history — all stored locally.
✨ Features
🔄 Auto-Capture
- Automatically monitors every terminal using VS Code's shell integration.
- Captures: command, full output, duration, working directory, and terminal name.
- Terminals are dynamically named using their Process ID (e.g.
terminal-[PID]).
- Smart ignore list — filters noisy commands (
ls, cd, clear, etc.) automatically.
- Configurable via VS Code settings or the in-panel Settings gear.
🔍 Search & Filter
- Full-text search across commands and output in real-time.
- Filter chips: All · ✅ Success · ⛔ Errors · 🔌 Closed · ⭐ Starred.
- Closed Filter Indicator: The interface shifts to a tinted orange background when filtering closed terminals.
- Today's History Toggle: Under the terminal tab strip, easily toggle between today's commands/terminals and your complete history. Defaults to
ON at startup.
📂 Terminal Grouping
- Commands are automatically grouped by individual terminal instances (
terminal-[PID]).
- Allows focusing on a single active or closed terminal tab in the tab strip.
💾 Flexible Exports
- Export any individual command with its output as
.txt, .md, or .json files.
- Export full history for any specific terminal as
.txt, .md, .json, or .pdf files.
- Export success notifications feature an Open Folder action to instantly view files in Finder/Explorer.
- PDF exports format CLI output inside beautiful editor-like dark code blocks using monospace fonts.
↩ One-Click Replay
- Click Replay on any log to instantly re-run the command in a new terminal window.
⭐ Star & Preserve
- Star important logs — they are exempt from automatic cleanup and kept forever until deleted manually.
📊 Stats Dashboard
- Daily command count, success rate, error rate.
- 7-day activity heatmap and top 5 most-used command triggers.
🔴 Status Bar Indicator
- Live status bar item shows capture state (
▶ TTM / ⏸ TTM).
- Click to toggle capture on/off or pause.
🚀 Getting Started
- Install the extension.
- The ⏳ icon appears in the Activity Bar — click it to open the sidebar.
- Open a terminal and run any command (ensure Shell Integration is active).
- Your commands appear automatically in the History panel.
- Use search, filter chips, or select individual terminal tabs to find what you need.
⌨️ Keyboard Shortcut
| Action |
Mac |
Windows / Linux |
| Focus Terminal History |
Cmd+Shift+H |
Ctrl+Shift+H |
🔧 Commands
Open the Command Palette (Cmd+Shift+P) and search for:
| Command |
Description |
Terminal Time Machine: Search Terminal History |
Focus the history panel |
Terminal Time Machine: Export History |
Export full history for a selected terminal |
Terminal Time Machine: Clear Old Logs |
Manually delete logs older than retention period |
Terminal Time Machine: Toggle Capture |
Pause / resume automatic capture |
Terminal Time Machine: Show Daily Stats |
Open the stats dashboard |
⚙️ Configuration
Set these configurations in VS Code or in the Settings panel:
- Capture Enabled: Toggle switch to pause or resume recording.
- Retention Days: Automatically prunes older unstarred logs. Set to
0 to keep logs forever.
- Ignored Commands: Array of command patterns to exclude.
{
"terminalTimeMachine.retentionDays": 7,
"terminalTimeMachine.captureEnabled": true,
"terminalTimeMachine.autoIgnoreCommands": ["ls", "ll", "la", "cd", "clear", "pwd", "history", "exit", "cls"]
}
🗄️ Data Storage
All data is stored locally in VS Code's global storage directory as a JSON file. No data ever leaves your machine.
🏗️ Development
npm install
npm run compile
# Press F5 to launch Extension Development Host
🔗 Connect
Made with ❤️ by Siva
