dev-tracker

Cross-session memory for Claude Code — a structured development journal that doesn't hallucinate, doesn't spam, and doesn't rewrite your notes.

What it does

Claude Code loses context between sessions. You come back to a project after a week and Claude doesn't know what was decided, what's blocked, or what's next. You end up re-explaining the same things every time.

dev-tracker fixes that with four files, each with a clear owner:

File	Purpose	Who writes it
TODO.md	Raw notes, rough ideas	You — Claude never rewrites it automatically
DEVLOG.md	Timestamped session log with Done / Decisions / Blockers / Next	Claude
DECISIONS.md	Architecture decisions in ADR-lite format (D-001, D-002…)	Claude
CLAUDE.md	Durable conventions that Claude Code auto-loads every session	Claude (with strict size discipline)

Why another journal skill?

There are a few out there. This one is different because it:

• Refuses to hallucinate git output. No invented commits, no fake file-change counts. If git isn't available, it says so and uses conversation context only.
• Has explicit anti-fragmentation. One DEVLOG entry per session, with session boundaries defined by hard triggers — not by "how long was the pause".
• Has explicit anti-overlogging for decisions. Under-logging is recoverable via /dev-tracker audit. Over-logging silently pollutes DECISIONS.md and degrades it forever. So the default is: when in doubt, don't write to DECISIONS.
• Treats TODO.md as user-owned. Never rewrites, translates, or clears it automatically.
• Treats CLAUDE.md as context tax. Has a size warning because every byte there is paid on every future session.
• Handles corrections properly. Wrong past entries get appended corrections, not silent rewrites. The audit trail stays intact.
• Speaks your language. Tracker prose follows your working language; keys like D-001, Status: active stay in English.

Four rounds of iteration went into this (v1 → v2 → v3 → v3.1 → v3.2), each driven by real use on production projects. See CHANGELOG for the full story including the v2 release bug that got fixed in v3.

Install

Option 1 — Plugin marketplace (recommended)

In Claude Code:

/plugin marketplace add printagram/skill-dev-tracker
/plugin install dev-tracker@printagram-skills

Option 2 — Direct install

# User-level (available in all projects)
git clone https://github.com/printagram/skill-dev-tracker.git
mkdir -p ~/.claude/skills
cp -r skill-dev-tracker/plugins/dev-tracker ~/.claude/skills/

# Or project-local (scoped to one project)
cp -r skill-dev-tracker/plugins/dev-tracker .claude/skills/

Restart Claude Code after either option.

Usage

Natural language (preferred)

You: session start
You: session start db_assistant       # with a project alias
You: save progress
You: session end
You: what did we do last time?

Slash commands

/dev-tracker              Write/update current session entry
/dev-tracker status       Show last entry, blockers, next steps
/dev-tracker context      Full context restore after a break (read-only)
/dev-tracker init         Create DEVLOG.md, DECISIONS.md, TODO.md
/dev-tracker decisions    Show active decisions grouped by status
/dev-tracker diff         Summarize changes since last entry
/dev-tracker audit        Find undocumented decisions

Multi-project

Create a .dev-tracker-projects.json in a parent directory listing your projects. See project-registry.example.json. Then:

You: session start WebUI
You: session start API

Each alias gets its own DEVLOG / DECISIONS / TODO. Supports monorepos (one repo, multiple tracked sub-projects) and non-git directories.

Example output

A session-end entry looks like this:

## 2026-03-18 14:40 CET — Access ODBC field name mismatch

### Done
- discovered sync failures were caused by code using `id_Order`
  while Access exposes the field as `idx_Order`
- replaced all 14 occurrences across sync_access_to_supabase.py,
  sync_schema.py, mod_sync.bas
- re-ran sync, 523/523 orders synced clean
- updated CLAUDE.md with the correct field name

### Decisions
- canonical field name in all sync code is `idx_Order` (see D-003)

### Next
1. write remediation script for the `201\` corrupted folders
2. document the sync lifecycle in CLAUDE.md

See plugins/dev-tracker/examples/ for full examples of all four files.

How it's different from…

Tool	Scope	What it does well	Where dev-tracker fits
Claude's built-in CLAUDE.md	Auto-loaded conventions	Fast context	Too broad — mixes decisions, conventions, and narrative. dev-tracker splits these.
Generic "memory" plugins	Arbitrary state	Flexible	No discipline on what to record; drifts into noise.
Git commit messages	History of changes	Precise, timestamped	Describes what changed, not why or what's next.
Issue trackers	Work to be done	Team coordination	Too heavy for a solo developer's cross-session notes.

dev-tracker fills the gap between "Claude remembers nothing between sessions" and "full-blown project management". It's a journal, not a tracker, not a wiki, not a commit history.

What's new in 3.2

• save progress is now a hard action — writes immediately, no "should I save?"
• /dev-tracker context for returning to a project after a break (read-only)
• Anti-fragmentation formalized (one entry per session, explicit boundary rules)
• Anti-overlogging rule for DECISIONS
• Session title guidance with anti-patterns
• Recurring blockers detection

Full history in CHANGELOG.

Contributing

Bug reports, feature requests, and PRs are welcome. See CONTRIBUTING.md for guidelines.

The skill is iterated with evals — see plugins/dev-tracker/evals/. If you add behavior, add a matching eval prompt.

License

MIT — see LICENSE. Use it, fork it, adapt it. If you improve it, consider upstreaming.

Acknowledgements

The ADR-lite decision format is adapted from Michael Nygard's original ADR pattern. Progressive-disclosure skill structure follows Anthropic's Agent Skills spec.

Built and iterated on real production work at Printagram — a printing, embroidery, and advertising company in Malta migrating from Microsoft Access to a modern cloud stack. If the rules feel opinionated, it's because they come from breakage.