Paca

A simple TUI app for task, timer and invoicing for projects.

Track your time and bill for it without leaving the terminal. If Paca saves you a few minutes a week, a ⭐ on GitHub helps other freelancers find it.

Features

• Project Management - Organize tasks by projects with color coding
• Task Tracking - Create, edit, and manage tasks with priorities and statuses
• Time Tracking - Start/stop timers with descriptions and hourly rates
• Timesheets - View uninvoiced time entries grouped by project
• Stripe Invoicing - Create draft invoices directly from time entries
• Invoice Management - View and manage all your Stripe invoices
• Dashboard - Overview of projects, tasks, and time stats
• Reports - Weekly/monthly hour & earnings analytics, trends, client and project breakdowns, work patterns
• Menu Bar - Native macOS menu bar companion for quick timer control
• Offline-first - All data stored locally in SQLite
• Vim-style Navigation - Keyboard-driven interface

Installation

Via npm (recommended)

npm install -g pacatui
paca

Via bun

bun install -g pacatui
paca

From source

git clone https://github.com/wes/paca.git
cd paca
bun install
bun run start

Usage

Simply run:

paca

On first run, Paca will automatically create its database at ~/.paca/paca.db.

Keyboard Shortcuts

Global

Key	Action
1	Dashboard
2	Tasks
3	Timesheets
4	Invoices
5	Reports
6	Settings
?	Help
t	Start timer
s	Stop timer (when running)
q	Quit

Navigation

Key	Action
j / ↓	Move down
k / ↑	Move up
Tab	Switch panels
Enter	Select/Confirm
Esc	Cancel/Go back

Reports

Key	Action
← / → or h / l	Previous/next report
[ / ]	Previous/next report
j / k or ↑ / ↓	Scroll
PgUp / PgDn	Page through a report
r	Recalculate

Projects & Tasks

Key	Action
n	Create new
e	Edit
d	Delete
Space	Toggle task status
p	Cycle priority
a	Archive/Unarchive project
A	Toggle show archived
c	Link customer to project

Timesheets

Key	Action
Space	Select entry for invoicing
e	Edit time entry
d	Delete time entry
i	Create invoice from selected

Invoices

Key	Action
Enter	Open invoice in browser
r	Refresh list
]	Next page
[	Previous page

Configuration

Settings

Access settings by pressing 6:

• Business Name - Your business name for invoices
• Stripe API Key - Enable invoicing features
• Timezone - Set display timezone (or auto-detect)
• Menu Bar - Toggle the macOS menu bar companion
• Export/Import - Backup and restore your data

Data Location

• Database: ~/.paca/paca.db
• Backups: ~/.paca/backups/ — exports and daily auto-backups, with the Stripe key removed

Both live in a 0700 directory with 0600 files, readable only by you.

Menu Bar (macOS)

Paca includes a native macOS menu bar companion that shows your running timer and lets you start/stop timers without opening the TUI.

Enable via Settings

1. Press 6 to open Settings
2. Select Menu Bar and press Enter to toggle it on

Enable via CLI

paca menubar enable    # Compile & launch
paca menubar disable   # Stop & remove
paca menubar status    # Show current status

The first time you enable it, Paca compiles a small native Swift helper binary (requires Xcode Command Line Tools). The paca mascot icon appears in your menu bar with live timer status.

Requires: Xcode Command Line Tools (xcode-select --install)

Stripe Integration

To enable invoicing:

1. Create a restricted key at dashboard.stripe.com/apikeys → Create restricted key. Paca needs exactly two write permissions:

   • Customers — Write
   • Invoices — Write

   Leave everything else set to None. The key starts with rk_.

2. Press 6 to go to Settings

3. Add the key under Stripe API Key

4. Link customers to projects using c in the Projects view

5. Create invoices from the Timesheets view

Use a restricted (rk_) key, not a standard secret (sk_) key. A secret key can move money, read your full customer list and issue refunds; a restricted key scoped as above can only do what Paca actually does. Paca will warn you if you paste an sk_ key.

Where the key is stored

The key is stored in plain text in the SQLite database at ~/.paca/paca.db, which Paca keeps at 0600 inside a 0700 directory. That protects it from other users on the machine. It does not protect it from anything running as you, so:

• Do not put ~/.paca in a synced folder (Dropbox, iCloud Drive, a dotfiles repo).
• Exports and the daily auto-backup in ~/.paca/backups/ have the Stripe key stripped out, so those files are safe to copy elsewhere. After restoring from a backup, re-enter your key in Settings.
• Rotate the key in the Stripe dashboard if you suspect the file has been copied.

Tech Stack

• Runtime: Bun
• TUI Framework: @opentui/react
• Database: SQLite via libsql
• ORM: Prisma 7
• Payments: Stripe API

Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please see CONTRIBUTING.md for guidelines.

License

MIT - see LICENSE for details.