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Show HN: Deaf? My iPhone app wakes you up if it hears an alarm
- fredleblanc 13y agoI'm not deaf, and I have virtually no experience building things specifically for those that are, but this seems like a great idea. Nice work!
- alexvr 13y agoThank you! I'm a college student with an early class (so I have to go to bed earlier than most people), and my dorm can be pretty loud, so I often sleep with earplugs. I didn't like the idea of possibly not waking up in a fire, so I made this to cure my paranoia :p I don't know how many people will find it useful, but it seemed like something that should exist.
- fredleblanc 13y agoI think that the best ideas come from that things that the creators personally want/need. You found a problem relevant to you, and solved it in a simple, elegant way. It's going to help you, and might even make you a couple bucks on the side. Sounds like a win all around to me.
- herokusaki 13y agoGreat idea for an app! I sleep with earplugs occasionally and I can see myself using your app in that situation. That said, I've been wondering lately if using earplugs often is a healthy thing to do in the long run. I couldn't find any pertinent research about non-professional users. Edit: phrasing.
- alexvr 13y agoI wonder the same thing. I find that I dream more when I can hear rain on the roof, so maybe ambient sounds (or a lack thereof) have a real effect on sleep
- ldonley 13y agoI too sleep with earplugs in I've noticed something similar. When I take naps during the day and I use the plugs I find that it is the best sleep I get, I feel super refreshed. During the night when I sleep with earplugs in I usually don't sleep as well as I would without them (minus the loud roommates). But I am a side sleeper with a memory foam pillow so it tends to cause some pressure on my ears for prolonged sleep periods.
- dannypgh 13y agoHumans aren't good judges of how often they dream. You have REM sleep several times a night and generally if you're woken up during REM sleep you will say that you were dreaming. It is probably more likely that you are simply remembering dreams more when you can hear rain on the roof - either by power of suggestion, or because the stimulus of the rain noise is noticeable and memorable in your dreams, or because the rain itself is waking you up. This isn't to say that you're wrong - there most certainly is an effect - but whether that effect is positive or negative is unclear.
- mikeash 13y agoI totally agree. What a simple yet brilliant idea that will really help people. I wish we could see more stuff like this on the front page and less of the usual "we built a SaaS as a Service service to deliver waffles to your business" stuff.
- QuantumChaos 13y agoGreat idea. I just hope this sort of thing isn't over-regulated.
- alexvr 13y agoYeah, I sort of worry about legal and moral issues. I'd feel horrible if someone died in a fire or something while relying on my app. I want people view it as more of a backup that will at least improve their chances. It's better to have a chance than nothing, right?
- davb 13y agoI had a similar thought. Less about the regulation, more about liability. If I'm deaf and I pay for an app to tell me when an alarm is sounding, I have a certain expectation that it has been rigorously tested and will work without fail. And I'm a software engineer who understands the limitations and failure modes of such applications on non-real-time, commodity kit. Please be extra careful about how you market this. I absolutely applaud your ingenuity, but I'd feel differently if I found out my elderly, hard of hearing gran was relying on any app on her smartphone to wake her if she left the stove on and went to bed. I expect a proportion of your customers may be less technical users (or well-meaning relatives) with little understanding of the limitations and risks. However, it is indeed an interesting idea. There may already be something on the market, but what about developing it into a physical device running on dedicated hardware? Crowd-fund an "alerter badge" or pin or whatever, and budget heavily for testing & verification. You could be onto a winner. EDIT: Please don't be put off altogether by the comments. It's simply that non-real-time, non-failsafe smartphones aren't built for life-critical applications like this. The idea isn't a bad one - you're just targeting the wrong platform.
- alexvr 13y agoThanks for the great comment. It's rigged to err on the false positive side, to be safe. I didn't expect this sort of interest, honestly, so I'll probably need to improve the app and make it as safe as possible if I find that people are actually using it.
- 13y ago
- ahoy 13y agoThis is fascinating. What do deaf people normally do in lieu of alarm clocks?
- andyjohnson0 13y agoI believe vibrating or very loud alarms are commonly used. http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/?ie=UTF8&keywords=alarm+clocks+for+the+deaf http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/?ie=UTF8&keywords=alarm+clocks+for...
- MatthewWilkes 13y agoBright light ones seemed quite popular in the deaf flats at my university.
- andyhmltn 13y agoGreat idea. OP: Why not allow the app to use the camera flash as well? I (am not deaf) would prefer to have it on my desk so it can actually listen rather than under a pillow where I'm more likely to knock it out of reach
- alexvr 13y agoThanks. Everyone seems to want a visual cue as well. I'll definitely look into using the flash!
- primitivesuave 13y agoMy girlfriend is partially deaf in one ear, so sometimes she will oversleep if she is lying on her good ear. A while back I built her an Arduino-powered alarm clock that uses a servo to repeatedly poke her with a foam finger (those big hands you wear at football games). It was a shoddy prototype, but the cool part was it synchronized with her iCal calendar. So, to answer your question, some [partially] deaf people use a makeshift Arduino robot that is duct taped to the wall next to their bed.
- mbateman 13y ago
- blux 13y agoWhy not set a vibrating alarm on your phone directly...?
- thejosh 13y agoAwesome app, can see this coming in handy... you need to promote this and also have an android client before a clone comes out. :) How is the battery consumption if it runs in the background? I'm guessing it isn't really a worry because if you are in bed you might have a charger, but the best use would be a in a pocket where it be awkward to use a charger, unless you place it under your pillow?
- alexvr 13y agoThanks! It uses around a quarter of your battery overnight. Maybe less. The ideal place is somewhere close to you, like under your pillow or in your pocket, but pillows and covers may dampen the noise. Any suggestions on getting the word out? I'm psyched that it's on the front page of HN, and never would have thought it would be, but it would be great if anyone knows of places to reach more of the target market.
- tlrobinson 13y agoI'm not familiar with online deaf communities, but blogs and forums would probably be a good start.
- sbjustin 13y agoThis sounds like a lawsuit waiting to happen. I think it's a great idea, but at 2.99 I don't think it's going to be profitable enough to take on the lawsuit risk.
- alexvr 13y agoYeah, I certainly hope that doesn't happen. I just wanted to make something that makes the world ever so slightly better for a few people. It's too bad if those are the consequences of making something with good intentions, ya know?
- frogpelt 13y agoEDIT: Let me preface by saying, the fact that a person could be sued for creating an app that creates a solution where few or none existed is both utterly ridiculous and highly likely. Which is why I think... ...There needs to some kind of legislation/regulation on lawsuits. Perhaps, the plaintiff must pay the legal fees for the defendant upfront, up to a maximum of 5% of the desired damages being sought. Example: If you want to sue for a $1 million, you have to pay up to $50K in legal fees for the defendant. If you win the case, the defendant's legal fees are tacked onto the damages that he must pay. If you lose the case, you lose all your money. I think this would discourage many lawsuits from happening. Only those with true merit would be pursued.
- dkrich 13y agoMaybe useful for some small-claims suits, but not so great for tort cases that have merit. If a negligent company continues to produce toys that hurt children, should the family have to pay 5% of the potential damages before getting a day in court? I don't think suits against game manufacturers like this necessitate any kind of legislation. Why? Simple. Like my lawyer told me when I was building my first app- "Sure you COULD get sued, but you don't have two nickels to rub together. No attorney would take a case against you." In business getting sued is a good thing. It means you're successful.
- square1 13y agoWhat basis do you have for this statement? 'Sounds like' and 'i don't think' are not very convincing. Any reliance on an app such as this is going to be at the risk of the user. This is a tool for assistance and is not in anyway a replacement for standard emergency protocol.
- beenpoor 13y agoMeaningful app. You are charging 2.99$ - but I still don't feel bad. It's a useful app and we need more of such apps, even though the price is > 0.99$.
- wunderlust 13y agoIt's a good start, but it may serve best to remind us of the limitations of basic technology. Instead of an X detector, what we have is an X detector detector. From a design perspective this is obviously odd. On the other hand, in a sense it's a multi-detector, since in theory it should respond to detectors of many sorts. There are some upsides to that.
- alexvr 13y agoHaha, yep. It'll wake you up if you're close enough to a jackhammer or if you're sleeping on a railroad, too. Don't try that at home :p
- htk 13y agoYou can also see this tool as a sense translator. It is translating hearing to touch, and maybe sight in the future (if the camera flash is also used). This way we can let the detectors do what they do best, and translate the physical phenomenon used by the signal, if we don't have the physiological capacity necessary to detect it.
- elwell 13y ago> From a design perspective this is obviously odd. I disagree. It's unifying, and that's a good thing.
- ycmike 13y agoThis is so useful. I am an extremely deep sleeper - when I do that is - who never hears his multiple alarms. God bless you.
- devanti 13y agoVibrating for it to wake you means you need to keep it close to your body. I wonder what health implications it may have -- In general its really bad to have a cell phone touching your body for prolonged periods of time because of the radiation it emits.
- DangerousPie 13y agoI would really like to see a citation for that!
- devanti 13y agoGoogle it. It's all over the internet http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_phone_radiation_and_health http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_phone_radiation_and_heal...
- DangerousPie 13y agoBecause if it's all over the internet, it must be true? The wiki page even says: The WHO added that "to date, no adverse health effects have been established as being caused by mobile phone use." As far as I can tell there has, to date, not been a single proper study that actually showed any effects. Just a bunch of fearmongering and cases like this: http://retractionwatch.com/2012/03/26/rabbits-neednt-worry-about-cell-phones-effects-on-their-sperm-count-say-three-retractions/ http://retractionwatch.com/2012/03/26/rabbits-neednt-worry-a...
- scott_s 13y agoThere is no evidence of increased cancer risk from cell phones. Steven Novella has good posts on it. "Warning Labels on Cell Phones": http://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/warning-labels-on-cell-phones/ http://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/warning-labels-... and "Another Cell Phone – Cancer Review": http://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/another-cell-phone-cancer-review/ http://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/another-cell-ph...
- yongjik 13y ago
- marpalmin 13y agoHi alexvr, a bit out of topic question: How did you manage to get the background sound analysis approved? I have an app that does also sound analysis in the background for a different purpose and it gets constantly rejected because of that. Thanks!
- alexvr 13y agoI think audio recording is one of the few things you're allowed to do in the background. I didn't do anything special. Did they give you any specific reasons?
- marpalmin 13y agoThis was the message after the appeal: "We still found the app is inappropriately using background audio because it is recording audio in the background for an indefinite period of time, which is not appropriate."
- alexvr 13y agoMaybe they don't think it's necessary or appropriate to what you're doing with the sound?
- simias 13y agoMaybe marpalmin was recording and storing big audio files, which might be a privacy issue I assume (if the user forgets the app is running in the background and ends up recording sensitive/private info). On the other hand I assume that you don't need to keep long audio samples to run your alarm-recognition algorithm and just discard the audio almost right away. That's just a wild guess of course, it would just seem reasonable to me if the Apple reviewers saw it that way.
- marpalmin 13y agoI'm not storing audio. Just audio analysis, of course I have a small buffer but that's normal for realtime audio anaylsis. I'm using it to detect footsteps.
- Aardwolf 13y agoAm I the only one who can't view the website? It is briefly visible for a second, then redirects to a "itmss://" URL and says "The address wasn't understood".
- larrik 13y agoIt's an iTunes link, if you don't have iTunes installed it doesn't really work.
- francescfont 13y agooh, but it shows the website for a second.. so the browser actually can display it, right?
- Aardwolf 13y agoIt does work, if you press "stop" within the second before it redirects. Not very user friendly.
- francescfont 13y agoNeither can I... running firefox on ubuntu
- ef4 13y agoThis is one of the terrible things about the iTunes store. Thankfully there's now a really nice alternative front-end for browsing their content: https://fnd.io/#/iphone-app/845405123-deafalarm-by-alex-reidy https://fnd.io/#/iphone-app/845405123-deafalarm-by-alex-reid... It's actually faster than their own website, built directly against Apple's APIs. (Not associated with http://fnd.io http://fnd.io, I just think it's cool.)
- mcculley 13y agoThis is very clever. The fact that it has to analyze audio makes me wonder if anybody is trying to standardize broadcasting of local emergency signals. For example, a standardized way to broadcast a fire alarm over WiFi or Bluetooth. There's more than local humans that could be alerted. Local systems could use it a cue to shutdown and remote service providers could be alerted that they have to do something.
- alexvr 13y agoYeah, I think Nest is actually doing something similar with their smoke detector, which is great.
- mcculley 13y agoAh, I didn't know that. A specific use case I was thinking of is some local hotels that my company does IT for. Hotels have lots of third party systems embedded locally and service providers doing stuff for them. If the fire alarm sounds, I'm sure they would love to know about it so they can react faster, either for assisting with the immediate crisis or facilitating the recovery. As far as I can tell, the fire detection/alarm systems are stovepipes that don't tell any other systems (other than 911) what is going on.
- farber 13y agoOne example of an existing use of this sort of thing, is that fire alarm systems commonly notify the building's lift controller, which sends the lift to the ground floor and opens the doors.
- Aardwolf 13y agoIf you're deaf, how do you transfer the vibrations of the phone to your senses? Sleep with the phone on you somehow?
- sizzle 13y agounder the pillow
- burntwater 13y agoI used to keep my cellphone under my pillow when I was on-call, but I don't like the idea of zapping my head with direct radio signals for 8 hours at a time. Unfortunately if I keep my iPhone to the side of the mattress, the vibrations aren't strong enough.
- sizzle 13y agoI've been using an old android phone on airplane mode for the same reason. I just end up snoozing it and sleeping so the bed shaker sounds great.
- Jemaclus 13y agoI'm confused. iPhones have an alarm clock already, and you can already set it to vibrate. Why do I need this app? (Serious question. I'm hard of hearing, and I do this with my iPhone already.) To answer some other questions I see in the thread, they make alarm clocks and doorbells specifically for deaf people. I personally own an alarm clock that has an attachment that you slip under the mattress. The vibrations from the attachment shake the bed, waking me up. I don't use it anymore, since I share the bed with my girlfriend, but it worked wonders for me in college. Here's a website with some deaf-centric things like alarm clocks and doorbells: http://www.harriscomm.com/ http://www.harriscomm.com/
- OlivierLi 13y agoFrom the description : " It stays up all night, listening out for loud and repetitive noises like fire alarms, and vibrates to wake you up when it hears anything similar."
- maaaats 13y agoBecause this isn't an alarm clock, it's a vibrating alarm triggered by noise. It's not supposed to replace an alarm clock, but notify the deaf user about other things, like a fire alarm.
- cdelsolar 13y agoBecause you didn't read the article :(
- dang 13y agoThis post fell in rank because it triggered the flamewar detector. I've just restored it. If you see things suddenly reappear on the front page, it's often because a moderator saw a case like this.
- alexvr 13y agoAh, thank you for restoring it!
- dang 13y agoYou're welcome. Unfortunately, our algorithm sometimes mis-asseses an enthusiastic discussion as an angry one. The solution is for a human to review the list. I wrote software just for that, but we can't watch it at all times. And the flamewar detector has proven so valuable to HN that turning it off would do more harm than good, so we won't.
- swalsh 13y agoCurious, how does the flamewar detector work? Is it looking at velocity of commenting? Specific language perhaps?
- icebraining 13y agoFrom some previous post (don't ask me to find it), it takes into consideration the number of comments vs votes. Many more comments than votes imply a flamewar.
- dang 13y agoWe're committed to increasing transparency, but the HN algorithms will probably remain an exception to that; certainly for the time being.
- wavesum 13y agoVery nice! Reminds me a bit from our effort to try to help deaf people dance: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CT_RmvKTUYc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CT_RmvKTUYc Unfortunately we could not make the app really work as the precision of timer on Windows phone is horrible, and on IOS you don't have api to properly control vibration... maybe some day.
- alexvr 13y agoHey everyone, I really appreciate all of the positive feedback. This is quite thrilling as a college student. It's the first thing I've made that people actually understand and consider useful. If any of you download Deafalarm, please let me know how it works for you and what you would like to see improved. I could also use pointers on getting the word out to people in this niche market. Thank you very much, Alex
- roberthahn 13y agoAs someone who's deaf (not Deaf) thank you for making it. Sadly, the vibration the iPhone makes isn't strong enough for me but this is an awesome idea and I hope you succeed with it!
- alexvr 13y agoYou're welcome, and thank you for the comment. I noticed this as well; I'm definitely searching a way to make the vibration more noticeable. Someone else suggested abandoning the mobile phone platform altogether to make a more robust product in general. If not me, maybe Nest will do something like this with their smoke detectors. They're already connected to wifi, so it would just take a wifi-enabled vibrator do the same thing, perhaps more reliably. Still, it might be a while before every smoke detector is as smart as a Nest ;)
- ryanhuff 13y agoWhat about a specialized device that operates off of low energy bluetooth for communicating to the iphone? Something like this could be built with Arduino or Raspberry Pi. John Muir, the American environmentalist of the 1800-1900's, built an "alarm clock" in 1862 that would dump the occupant off the bed at the defined time.
- pndmnm 13y agoI really wish that the Fitbit Flex was more hackable -- if I could get a low-power bluetooth fob that could vibrate and display a few lights embedded in my watchband, that would really be all the smartwatch I need.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- CanSpice 13y agoThis app listens for other alarms, like fire alarms, and then vibrates when it hears them. It's not replacing the alarm clock.
- brudgers 13y agoIn the US, visual alarms are pretty much standard under all the life safety codes for commercial buildings including apartments.[1] When they are not provided, both ADA and the Fair Housing Act [1] both dictate that owners provide them to accommodate the disability. If there's a problem, the fire marshal is a good person to call. They've typically pulled enough bodies from tragedies to last a lifetime, and this shapes their attitude toward non-compliance. [1] Life safety codes as distinct from building codes apply to all buildings not just those newly constructed. [2] Likewise for ADA and the Fair Housing Act. There are also state equivalents of both of these in many states that may be more restrictive.
- tlrobinson 13y agoCan visual alarms wake a person up?
- chrisabrams 13y agoI was wondering the same thing.
- brudgers 13y agoAppropriately placed, almost certainly. A 75 Candela strobe in a bedroom is pretty much impossible to sleep through.
- ggchappell 13y agoIn light of a recent HN discussion on the incomprehensibility of many product pages and "Show" posts[1], I think it's worth noting that this is a very clear page that lets me know exactly what the product is, how much it costs, and how to get it. :-) [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7489870 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7489870
- alexvr 13y agoThank Apple for that ;)
- sdrothrock 13y agoAs a hearing-impaired user, I'd actually love something like this if I could "train" it to specific sounds, like my doorbell. Since my phone is almost always in my pocket or hand at home, it would be very easy to feel the vibration and I'd know someone rang the doorbell.
- Houshalter 13y agoThat's a cool idea. I'm not sure how reliable machine learning on audio would be with only a few samples though.
- sdrothrock 13y agoI'm not sure either, but I want to say that since the sound will be at a given frequency in a given pattern, you could probably pick it out relatively reliably... Also, unlike fire alarms, I think I'd be less worried about false positives or the thing not working -- it would be an annoyance, not something that could potentially endanger my life.
- Houshalter 13y agoUnsupervised learning to extract high level features might work. Then get examples of the kinds of sounds people are training it on and use that to extract even better features.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- prateek_mir 13y agoI like the idea, and the objective it aims at fulfilling, I am not aware of the US regulations, but I think if you can hack a wristband like wearable gadget to work with it (of-course it needs to have a vibrator in it), then you can overcome the problem of keeping the cell phone close to your body.
- befuddled 13y ago"...listening out for loud and repetitive noises like fire alarms, and vibrates to wake you up when it hears anything similar" Would that include dog barking? And do you plan to offer it for iPad/Android at any stage?