Product Telemetry and Privacy

August 11, 2026 ยท View on GitHub

Open Knowledge collects bounded product telemetry to measure installation, activation, useful command activity, daily activity, and sanitized errors.

CLI telemetry is enabled by default. The CLI prints a disclosure before it sends the first event. Telemetry commands do not send events. JSON error mode waits for a prior telemetry disclosure. Installer preflight and continuous integration do not send telemetry.

Google Analytics uses Advanced Consent Mode v2 on the landing and getting-started pages. Before a visitor chooses, analytics_storage is denied. Google receives cookieless measurement pings and does not read or write Analytics cookies.

Select Allow to set analytics_storage to granted. Google Analytics can then use first-party Analytics cookies. ad_storage, ad_user_data, and ad_personalization remain denied in both states.

The first-party website relay requires explicit consent. It records no website event before consent.

Use Analytics preferences in the website footer to change the website choice. No cookies deletes the random browser ID and Analytics cookies. Cookieless Google Analytics measurement continues.

CLI controls

okn telemetry status
okn telemetry show-payload
okn telemetry disable
okn telemetry enable
okn --no-telemetry <command>

Put --no-telemetry before the command. This option disables telemetry for the current command and future commands. It also deletes the random installation ID.

Set DO_NOT_TRACK=1 or OPENKNOWLEDGE_TELEMETRY=off for a process-level override. These variables do not change the saved preference.

The CLI stores its preference under the operating system user configuration directory. The file is openknowledge/telemetry.json and uses user-only access.

Collected data

CLI events can include only these fields:

  • Random installation and event IDs
  • CLI version, operating system, and architecture
  • Allowlisted command and subcommand names
  • Success, usage error, or command failure
  • A coarse duration bucket
  • First command, successful setup, first meaningful use, and daily activity

First-party website events can include a random browser ID after consent. They can record a landing-page view or a successful setup-prompt copy.

Google cookieless pings can include the page URL, user agent, screen resolution, and IP address. Google states that Google Analytics does not store or log the IP address. See the Consent Mode reference.

The /install redirect records an aggregate install attempt. It stores only a fixed source label and a normalized client family, such as curl or browser. The homepage copy uses a visible fixed source=homepage query. It does not use a browser or installation identifier.

install_redirect_requested records a request for the tracked install path. It does not confirm a completed installation. cli_first_command records the first observed CLI run. Setup and meaningful-use events require successful commands.

Excluded data

Open Knowledge first-party telemetry envelopes do not contain:

  • Command arguments, paths, file names, URLs, queries, or repository names
  • Knowledge content, command output, error messages, or agent transcripts
  • User accounts, email addresses, hostnames, or machine-derived identifiers
  • IP addresses or raw user-agent strings

The hosting platform processes network connections. The first-party relay does not add request IP addresses or raw user agents to events or upstream requests.

These exclusions do not apply to direct Google Analytics requests. Google controls its processing under its service terms and configured data controls.

Delivery

The CLI sends one bounded JSON envelope after a command finishes. Delivery uses a short timeout. A delivery failure does not change output or exit status.

The first-party relay accepts only documented fields and values. It rejects extra content. The relay converts accepted envelopes to PostHog's batch capture format only when an operator configures a PostHog ingestion endpoint and project token. The project token stays on the server. First-party website and CLI clients send only to the Open Knowledge relay.

The website also sends Google Analytics requests directly to Google. Consent Mode attaches the current storage and advertising consent states to those requests.

Every PostHog event sets $process_person_profile to false. The relay uses a surface-prefixed random ID as distinct_id: the random installation ID for CLI events, the consent-created random browser ID for web events, and the random event ID for aggregate install redirects. These identities are intentionally not joined across surfaces.

Sanitized failures appear as the cli_error product event. The relay also creates a synthetic PostHog $exception event for native issue grouping.

The synthetic exception uses only the command and error_kind for its fingerprint. It uses a fixed description and does not contain an error message, stack trace, source path, command arguments, or output.

The CLI event schema does not change. The CLI does not use the PostHog Go SDK or receive a PostHog project token.

Session observation is a separate local feature. --observe remains opt-in and does not change product telemetry.

Source anchors

  • packages/cli/internal/telemetry/
  • packages/cli/cmd/openknowledge/telemetry_command.go
  • packages/web/src/analytics.js
  • packages/web/scripts/server.mjs

Update notes

Update this page after a telemetry event, consent, identity, or retention change.