4 ms·

I get the intention. The challenge for me is that I don’t have any notion of flicking from one task to another, so I’d install this and guaranteed use it once,

I get the intention. The challenge for me is that I don’t have any notion of flicking from one task to another, so I’d install this and guaranteed use it once, maybe twice. Then poof, I’ve forgotten all about it and I’d rediscover it next time you post on HN.

tra3 4y ago
Same. I vaguely remember a tool that would ask you what you were doing periodically. I never got it to run, so I don’t know if itd be useful or a distraction.
- swah 4y ago
  There are automations similar to MacOS. On the 4th time you're deep into a task and just click OK in the box ...
- eitland 4y ago
  Manic Time is one such tool and the free version is completely without distraction. When you want you open it and get a colored timeline that you can hover over to see what program was active and the title of the active window. I pay for professional to get a notification everytime I have been away from the keyboard for a while. Then I can manually tag that time and specify for myself if it is work related or not, and in case I work on multiple projects, which one it relates to. The paid version also gives me a summarized time sheet view of the week and can store screenshots if I want to (I use it, although if I need to use the screenshots for documentation, like when I had to configure live remote systems using Windows Notepad and with no access to VCS a few years ago, then I use something else that saves high resolution :-)
  - tra3 4y ago
    Ahh I found it: http://messymatters.com/tagtime/ http://messymatters.com/tagtime/ The idea is that it's fully manual and only precise across weeks.
cal85 4y ago
This makes me think maybe I should try to make the jump to a terminal-first way of using computers, i.e. get a laptop that boots to a Linux command line and make that my 'home screen'. Seems like it would force me to stop and think when task-switching. Desktop environments seem designed to trick my brain into flicking between different activities without noticing.

tra3 4y ago

Same. I vaguely remember a tool that would ask you what you were doing periodically. I never got it to run, so I don’t know if itd be useful or a distraction.

swah 4y ago
There are automations similar to MacOS. On the 4th time you're deep into a task and just click OK in the box ...
eitland 4y ago
Manic Time is one such tool and the free version is completely without distraction. When you want you open it and get a colored timeline that you can hover over to see what program was active and the title of the active window. I pay for professional to get a notification everytime I have been away from the keyboard for a while. Then I can manually tag that time and specify for myself if it is work related or not, and in case I work on multiple projects, which one it relates to. The paid version also gives me a summarized time sheet view of the week and can store screenshots if I want to (I use it, although if I need to use the screenshots for documentation, like when I had to configure live remote systems using Windows Notepad and with no access to VCS a few years ago, then I use something else that saves high resolution :-)
- tra3 4y ago
  Ahh I found it: http://messymatters.com/tagtime/ http://messymatters.com/tagtime/ The idea is that it's fully manual and only precise across weeks.

cal85 4y ago

This makes me think maybe I should try to make the jump to a terminal-first way of using computers, i.e. get a laptop that boots to a Linux command line and make that my 'home screen'. Seems like it would force me to stop and think when task-switching. Desktop environments seem designed to trick my brain into flicking between different activities without noticing.