About

JobHakken is a local-first, standalone desktop app (plus a Chrome extension) for running a smarter job search — without handing your data to the cloud. It watches the boards and company career pages you care about, scores every listing against your résumé (an ATS keyword-match percentage and a Fit number), flags known H-1B and UK visa sponsors, and tailors résumés and cover letters on demand. Everything runs on your own machine against a local SQLite database, with a bring-your-own or managed LLM key — so there's no vendor lock-in and your résumé, notes, and application history never leave your computer.

On this blog we write about the mechanics of a modern job search: how ATS keyword matching actually works, the timing edge of applying early, decoding H-1B sponsorship data, tailoring a résumé without starting from scratch, and why a local-first tool keeps your search private.