Hi everyone,
I’m currently developing Tom’s OSINT Workbench. It’s about 45-60% complete, and I’m at the stage where I’d love to get some real world feedback to make sure the remaining development aligns with what investigators actually need.
The goal is a single, portable Windows EXE for structured investigations—think relationship mapping and entity tracking, but built specifically for those who can't (or won't) trust their data to a cloud service.
### THE OFFLINE-FIRST FEATURE SET
- Local Case Management: Everything is stored in portable SQLite files. No accounts, no subscriptions, and zero telemetry.
- The Connection Graph: A custom-coded force-directed engine (pure GDI+). It handles color-coded nodes and labeled relationships, with a pop-out window for multi-monitor workflows.
- Snapshot and Diffing: This is the core of the app. You can snapshot an entity's state and run a side-by-side color-coded diff (green/red/amber) to see exactly what changed on a domain or profile over time.
- Human-in-the-Loop Extraction: A Paste and Extract tool that crawls sites for contact info and metadata but lets you review and approve data before it enters your case file.
- Zero-Dependency Reporting: Generates dark-themed HTML reports that work entirely offline. Includes a filtered timeline and an AI Analysis prompt section for manual copy-pasting into LLMs if you choose to.
### TECHNICAL PROGRESS AND STACK
I’ve gone for a lean and mean architecture to keep the footprint tiny and the performance high:
- Stack: C++17 and Win32 API. No Electron, no frameworks, no web-view bloat.
- Current State: ~13,000 lines of code across 42 source files. It’s a work in progress, so that count is growing daily as I flesh out the features.
- Portability: Compiles to a single EXE with SQLite integrated. Runs without installation.
### SHAPING THE REST OF THE BUILD
Since the app is roughly halfway to its v1.0, I have some flexibility in the roadmap. I’m currently planning:
- Expanded social media parsers (LinkedIn, GitHub, Instagram, etc.).
- Local case encryption for high-sensitivity work.
- Advanced graph layouts (Hierarchical/Circular).
For the OSINT pros here: What is the one thing you hate about your current entity-to-relationship workflow? If you were moving away from spreadsheets or cloud tools, what feature would be a dealbreaker for you?
I’m building this for the community, so I’d love to hear what you think is missing from the current offline tool landscape.