Analytics and privacy

Skriuw uses two telemetry backends in the hosted web app:

• @remcostoeten/analytics receives product and server events.
• PostHog receives browser analytics through the same-origin /ph-ingest proxy.

Neither backend receives note content. The native desktop app does not include a browser or PostHog telemetry client.

Configure PostHog

Set the following environment variable in the Vercel project that deploys the web app:

NEXT_PUBLIC_POSTHOG_KEY=phc_...

NEXT_PUBLIC_POSTHOG_UI_HOST is optional and defaults to https://us.posthog.com. Browser requests use /ph-ingest, which the Next.js app rewrites to PostHog; do not point clients directly at the PostHog ingest host.

The documentation site is a separate Vercel project (skriuw-docs). Configure the same public key there as well when documentation traffic should be recorded in the same PostHog project. The key is public by design; never expose a PostHog personal API key in a NEXT_PUBLIC_* variable.

For production traffic, set the variable before deploying. Preview and development environments are optional and are useful only when test traffic is intended to appear in PostHog.

Consent and opt-out

Guest/demo visitors are tracked anonymously. Authenticated accounts have Usage analytics enabled by default and can turn it off in Settings → Privacy & analytics.

When an authenticated user opts out, Skriuw stops both client-side telemetry paths:

• @remcostoeten/analytics receives an opt-out signal and product-event helpers refuse to dispatch events.
• PostHog stops capturing and does not identify the user.

The preference is loaded before analytics makes a decision for an authenticated user, so a stored opt-out does not briefly enable capture during app startup.

Sign-in and sign-up completion are separate, server-side operational events in @remcostoeten/analytics; they are not sent to PostHog and do not depend on the browser preference.

Desktop behavior

The native desktop application has no PostHog SDK or client telemetry path. Normal local desktop use therefore sends no analytics. If a desktop user signs in through the hosted authentication backend, that backend may record the server-side sign-in/sign-up event described above.

Verify a deployment

After deployment, open the production web app as a guest, or enable Usage analytics for an authenticated account. In the browser network panel, confirm a request to /ph-ingest succeeds. A corresponding event should then appear in the configured PostHog project.

Localhost is intentionally excluded from PostHog capture.