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I've added an hourly chime to my work computer's clock, similar to a Casio wristwatch. It's a subtle reminder of the passing time, prompting me to pause, reflec

I've added an hourly chime to my work computer's clock, similar to a Casio wristwatch. It's a subtle reminder of the passing time, prompting me to pause, reflect, and reassess my actions to stay on track and avoid procrastination. I like this constant on screen reminder though and might give it a try myself :)

teddyh 1y ago
The gods confound the man who first found out how to distinguish hours! Confound him, too, who in this place set up a sundial, to cut and hack my days so wretchedly into small portions! When I was a boy, my belly was my sundial — one surer, truer, and more exact than any of them. This dial told me when ’twas proper time to go to dinner, when I had aught to eat; But nowadays, why even when I have, I can’t fall-to unless the sun gives leave. The town’s so full of these confounded dials the greatest part of the inhabitants, shrunk up with hunger, crawl along the street. — Plautus (c.254-184 BC) (Originally posted 11 years ago: <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7007731#7008338 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7007731#7008338>)
- Y_Y 1y ago
  (Originally posted 2225 years ago: https://la.wikisource.org/wiki/Comoediae_(Plautus)_-_Boeotia https://la.wikisource.org/wiki/Comoediae_(Plautus)_-_Boeotia )
InfiniteLoup 1y ago
I did something similar with a Telegram bot in order to remind myself to look away from the screen, get up and stretch for a bit. However I started to ignore it in favor of "more pressing" tasks and now the chime has become just a faint signal somewhere on the outer edge of my awareness, too easily forgotten about. You need to condition yourself to not ignore it or it will lose its effectiveness.
- bmacho 1y ago
  It probably depends on what your goal is. To get up and stretch every n minutes, a more forceful approach could work better. But a just an hourly subtle sound can *just remind you that time passes.
hispanus 1y ago
If anyone is searching for a way to do this in macOS, the dato[1] app implements this rather nicely [1]: https://sindresorhus.com/dato https://sindresorhus.com/dato
- swah 1y ago
  When there is a meeting too starting at the hour, its a bit too much :)
TimByte 1y ago
Pairing that with the on-screen focus prompt could create a nice feedback loop.
stryan 1y ago
I have a similar thing in my WFH office where Home Assistant will play a chime during at canonical hour[0], plus it plays the Westminster Quarters[1] at 5pm to remind me when the normal work day is ending. I find the chunks of time match up well to work/eat periods[2] versus the granularity of each hour. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canonical_hours#Western_rites https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canonical_hours#Western_rites ; for the work day the main chimes are at 7am, 10am, 12pm, 2pm, 7pm [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westminster_Quarters https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westminster_Quarters [2] I originally stole the idea from the game Pentiment, which uses the canonical hours as it's in game time system since you're working in a 16th monastery. A web app version of the clock is at https://pentiment-clock.vercel.app/ https://pentiment-clock.vercel.app/

teddyh 1y ago

The gods confound the man who first found out how to distinguish hours! Confound him, too, who in this place set up a sundial, to cut and hack my days so wretchedly into small portions! When I was a boy, my belly was my sundial — one surer, truer, and more exact than any of them. This dial told me when ’twas proper time to go to dinner, when I had aught to eat; But nowadays, why even when I have, I can’t fall-to unless the sun gives leave. The town’s so full of these confounded dials the greatest part of the inhabitants, shrunk up with hunger, crawl along the street. — Plautus (c.254-184 BC) (Originally posted 11 years ago: <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7007731#7008338 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7007731#7008338>)

Y_Y 1y ago
(Originally posted 2225 years ago: https://la.wikisource.org/wiki/Comoediae_(Plautus)_-_Boeotia https://la.wikisource.org/wiki/Comoediae_(Plautus)_-_Boeotia )

InfiniteLoup 1y ago

I did something similar with a Telegram bot in order to remind myself to look away from the screen, get up and stretch for a bit. However I started to ignore it in favor of "more pressing" tasks and now the chime has become just a faint signal somewhere on the outer edge of my awareness, too easily forgotten about. You need to condition yourself to not ignore it or it will lose its effectiveness.

bmacho 1y ago
It probably depends on what your goal is. To get up and stretch every n minutes, a more forceful approach could work better. But a just an hourly subtle sound can *just remind you that time passes.

hispanus 1y ago

If anyone is searching for a way to do this in macOS, the dato[1] app implements this rather nicely [1]: https://sindresorhus.com/dato https://sindresorhus.com/dato

swah 1y ago
When there is a meeting too starting at the hour, its a bit too much :)

TimByte 1y ago

Pairing that with the on-screen focus prompt could create a nice feedback loop.

stryan 1y ago

I have a similar thing in my WFH office where Home Assistant will play a chime during at canonical hour[0], plus it plays the Westminster Quarters[1] at 5pm to remind me when the normal work day is ending. I find the chunks of time match up well to work/eat periods[2] versus the granularity of each hour. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canonical_hours#Western_rites https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canonical_hours#Western_rites ; for the work day the main chimes are at 7am, 10am, 12pm, 2pm, 7pm [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westminster_Quarters https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westminster_Quarters [2] I originally stole the idea from the game Pentiment, which uses the canonical hours as it's in game time system since you're working in a 16th monastery. A web app version of the clock is at https://pentiment-clock.vercel.app/ https://pentiment-clock.vercel.app/