Effective date: October 18, 2026
BalloonForge is published by Entropy Tools Solutions. This policy applies to the BalloonForge Windows app and its BalloonForge Pro subscription add-on.
Information the app processes
BalloonForge processes files and information that you choose to use with it:
- PDF engineering drawings, including their text, annotations, title blocks, and other content. Drawings may contain personal or confidential information.
- Excel files that you select as report templates.
- Review-project data created by the app, such as recognized text and dimensions, balloon numbers and positions, review decisions, notes, correction history, and export details.
- Local app data, such as settings, recent-project file names and paths, project history, autosaves, detection caches, drawing profiles, and correction-learning records.
The app processes drawings, templates, projects, and OCR locally on your device. The app does not upload your source drawings, project files, report files, OCR results, or settings to Entropy Tools Solutions. Builds with the configured Sentry integration send crash diagnostics to Sentry, a service operated by Functional Software, Inc. You can disable crash reporting by setting BALLOONFORGE_DISABLE_TELEMETRY=1 before launching the app.
When enabled, crash diagnostics can include exception types and sanitized messages, stack frames, the app version, and general runtime and operating-system details. The app removes user identity, request data, breadcrumbs, machine names, local variables, source-code context, and local file paths before sending an event. It does not send drawing or report contents, OCR output, project files, or performance traces. Sentry processes diagnostics under its own privacy and data-processing terms.
Crash diagnostics can also contain fixed operation and processing-stage names, numeric system error codes, the output type, file-publication and rollback counts, and whether a task is running, canceled, or closing. These details help explain failures without sending file names, paths, document contents, or the identity of an application that holds a file open.
Basic usage statistics
Usage statistics help us estimate active installations and understand which features people use. When enabled, the app sends Sentry an app-launch record and a record for the first successful use of each supported feature during an app session, such as scanning, reviewing, or exporting. These records contain a fixed feature name, the app version, timestamps, whether the GUI or command line is used, and random installation and session IDs.
The installation ID is generated randomly and stored locally. It is not based on your name, Microsoft account, email address, computer name, or hardware. It links reported activity from the same installation across sessions. These counts estimate installations, not individual people.
Usage reporting is enabled by default. You can turn off Share basic usage statistics in Settings. You can also set BALLOONFORGE_DISABLE_USAGE_STATISTICS=1 before launch, or use BALLOONFORGE_DISABLE_TELEMETRY=1 to disable both usage and crash reporting. Usage records exclude drawing and report contents, OCR output, file paths and names, account details, hardware identifiers, screenshots, and recordings.
Sentry stores reported records under the publisher’s configured retention settings. Turning off reporting stops new usage records; it does not remove previously sent records. Deleting the local usage_installation_id file causes a new ID to be generated if reporting is enabled again.
Workflow milestones
When usage sharing is enabled, BalloonForge also reports repeated, predefined workflow milestones. These include opening a drawing, detection, review decisions, manual balloon creation, rescans, validation, and export requests and outcomes. Records include their order, timestamps, elapsed durations, random installation and session IDs, and fixed categories such as export mode or failure stage. The first created balloon and successful export help us understand whether users can complete their workflow. This is pseudonymous activity data; it can reveal patterns of app use, even though it does not contain drawing contents.
Each app session reports at most 500 milestones. The app does not record screens, mouse positions, entered values, document names or paths, drawing identifiers, OCR text, or report contents. Workflow events cannot include attachments. The same usage setting and environment-variable opt-outs apply. Turning sharing off stops new milestone collection and discards unfinished in-memory timing records. Already submitted events remain subject to Sentry’s retention settings. There is no durable local journey history or offline recording queue.
Optional aggregate product metrics
Additional product metrics are enabled by default when Share basic usage statistics is enabled. If you previously turned off usage sharing, that choice also disables these metrics. You can turn off usage sharing in Settings or set BALLOONFORGE_ENABLE_USAGE_METRICS=0 before launch to disable only the additional metrics. Either usage-reporting disable variable described above also blocks these metrics.
When enabled, these metrics report counts and numeric measurements for drawing opening and detection, review actions and review duration, focused rescans, placement cleanup, validation results, export attempts and outcomes, export duration, and encounters with the free export limit or the Pro upgrade action. Export outcomes can include coarse bands for correction and rescan counts. Validation categories use a fixed list of internal codes, not error messages or drawing text.
Drawing-format diagnostics may also inspect a limited sample of PDF pages locally to estimate whether the pages contain extractable text, raster images, or both. The app reports only fixed structural categories, sampled-page category counts, whether OCR was used, and the number of OCR candidates when available. At most 12 pages of a PDF are sampled for these diagnostics. File-size, time, and background-work limits can cause inspection to be skipped or incomplete. Structural categories are estimates and do not establish drawing-recognition accuracy or the source CAD software. No document text, graphics, file name, file path, drawing contents, or document identifier is transmitted.
These additional metrics do not contain installation, session, user, or machine identifiers. They do not contain file names, paths, drawing values, OCR text, screenshots, or recordings. They describe aggregate activity, not individual users or ordered user journeys. Session duration measures elapsed time until orderly closing, not active interaction time. Clicking the Pro action does not establish that a purchase occurred.
Sentry receives these metrics under the publisher’s retention settings. Turning off usage sharing stops new collection. Data already submitted can remain subject to those retention settings.
Where information is stored
Project files are stored on your device, normally beside the source drawing in a hidden .balloon-projects folder. If that location cannot be written, the app uses its local application-data folder. Other application data, including the local daily export count, is stored under your Windows user profile in .balloon_pdf_mvp.
These files remain on your device until you or Windows remove them. Removing a recent-project entry does not delete its project file. Uninstalling the app may not remove project files or application data stored outside the app package.
Feedback you choose to send
The Give feedback form sends your message directly to Sentry when you choose Send. You can optionally include a name, email address, and one image selected from a file or pasted from the clipboard. All contact fields are optional. The submission also includes the app version, environment, and submission time. The app does not automatically capture a screenshot or attach your drawing. It converts an attached image to PNG without its original filename or metadata. Image pixels can still contain personal information or drawing content; review them before submitting. We use this feedback to improve the product and respond when you provide contact details. The usage-statistics preference does not prevent an explicit feedback submission. Disabling all telemetry through BALLOONFORGE_DISABLE_TELEMETRY=1 also prevents sending feedback.
Support bundles
You can choose Tools > Create support bundle to create a diagnostic ZIP file on your device. The bundle can contain Windows and runtime details, the Tesseract version, project counts and review status, the drawing file name and fingerprint, and redacted project data. Redacted project data can still contain recognized drawing text and review details. The in-app support-bundle action excludes the source PDF.
Creating a support bundle does not send it to us. If you choose to send the bundle to our support contact, we use its contents to investigate and respond to your request. Do not send a bundle that contains information you are not authorized to share.
Microsoft Store purchases
Microsoft Store processes payments and manages subscriptions under Microsoft’s terms and privacy practices. The app does not receive your payment-card details. When Store licensing is enabled in a release, Windows may provide the app with the BalloonForge Pro subscription’s entitlement status so it can enable Pro features. Entitlement status is used for that purpose; the app does not need your Microsoft account password.
When information is shared
Standalone license activation
In direct-download builds with standalone licensing enabled, Lemon Squeezy processes checkout and subscriptions under its own terms and privacy practices. The app does not receive payment-card details. Activation, validation, and deactivation send your license key and its activation-instance ID to Lemon Squeezy over HTTPS. The activation uses the fixed name “BalloonForge desktop”, not your computer name. The provider also receives connection information such as your IP address. The app does not send drawing contents for licensing.
The app stores the key, instance ID, and a separate bounded offline-access record encrypted with Windows user-scoped data protection. Offline access lasts up to seven days after verification, capped by a known license expiration. License records are not sent to Sentry. Deactivating releases the computer’s activation; it does not cancel the subscription. Manage cancellation through the purchase provider. Microsoft Store and direct-download builds use separate purchase providers; a subscription from one does not activate the other.
Other sharing
The app does not automatically transmit your drawings, projects, reports, OCR results, or local file history. Builds with the configured Sentry integration send the limited diagnostics and usage statistics described above to Sentry. We receive information directly when you choose to contact us or send a support bundle. Microsoft processes Store purchases and subscription information as part of providing the Store service.
Your choices
You choose which drawings and templates to open, where to save exports and support bundles, and whether to send information to support. You can disable usage statistics in Settings and disable all reporting before launch by setting BALLOONFORGE_DISABLE_TELEMETRY=1. You can remove local project, profile, history, and application data using the files and folders on your device. You can manage or cancel a Microsoft Store subscription through your Microsoft account.
For a privacy request or question, contact:
Publisher: Entropy Tools Solutions
Email: vladimir.brkljaca.developer@outlook.com
Depending on where you live, you may have rights to request access to, correction of, or deletion of personal information. Contact us using the address above to make a request.
Changes to this policy
We will update this page when our information practices change. The effective date at the top shows when the current version took effect.