Show HN: I built an app that ensures that I track my home office working hours | Hacker News Reader

Show HN: I built an app that ensures that I track my home office working hours

waywo.simon-frey.eu

48 pointsl1am048 comments

I use three very simple aliases for the commandline,

  alias ttag='/cygdrive/c/Dropbox/tools/ttag/ttag.sh'
  alias ttagcat='cat /cygdrive/c/Dropbox/tools/ttag/ttag-logfile.txt'
  alias ttago='open /cygdrive/c/Dropbox/tools/ttag/ttag-logfile.txt'

where `ttag.sh` is

  # specify the logfile
  LOGFILE=/cygdrive/c/Dropbox/tools/ttag/ttag-logfile.txt
  # timestamp format
  TIMESTAMP_NICE=$(date +"%F %H.%M.%S - %s:")
  # always append to the logfile
  echo $TIMESTAMP_NICE "$@" >> $LOGFILE

simple enough for me :) very simple to add a small note from the commandline, which is timestamped. Makes it easier to get a grasp of how much time I've spent on something, eg when switching between customer projects.

I have aliases very similar to yours (only differences are that they're one or two characters long, and the logs use ISO 8601 date format). Super quick to append, read, and edit personal logs - no GUI could be better or more immediate. I often grep it, but gotta admit could use an automated way to calculate time differences.

yeah, I include timestamp not only in easy human readable format, but also in epoch timestamp, so it's easier to calculate time diffs between entries.

I've always been meaning of doing something like this, but never committed to it. Do you also wrote scripts to then parse the file? Like, can you get how much did you work on a certain project of for a certain client?

Nice idea! So do you use it similar to how you'd do a git commit?

Like a personal log, and it reduces the friction to add a small entry by not having to switch to a file and write, or add the datetime. I just go about and type something like

  > ttag starting to work at frontend X for customer Y

I was gonna say positive things until the page-wide unclosable buy-me-now popup jumped up. This is the kind of web no one wants to touch, even with a long stick, never mind sponsoring it through an annual payment.

Thank you for that reply! I totally get that and that's why you can click everywhere on the popup to close it.

But maybe a learning for me: Remove such marketing mehtods before posting to HackerNews.

To be honest the popup works quite good on other audiences, that's why I opted for it.

Sorry for crushing your experience with the site with this!

Same here. Looked around for a close button, clearly there wasn't one, quick way out.

If this is a product for tech-savvy workers, this is a great way to lose half your audience.

Yep. Should have known that before posting to HackerNews. Thanks for that reply :D

It is removed for now. (As it works quite good with other audiences I will add in a different form again)

Pop-ups work well, most people aren't technical and find no problem with them.

What do you mean by "work well"? Work well for who?

Just because a shitty, user-hostile web has been accepted by non-technical users (because they don't know any better) doesn't mean we should condone or encourage the behaviour.

The same applies to spammers, telemarketers, etc. We've more or less "accepted" them as an ever-present nuisance, but it doesn't mean we should legitimise nor approve that scummy behaviour.

They work well for the creator of the site. If the prime metric is, are people wanting what I'm providing and it's easy for them to do so, then pop-ups work very well. If the metric is, is my site pristine enough for other engineers, then no they don't work well, as seen by the responses here. The choice is in what to optimize for. If it works, it works, regardless of whatever scumminess you may perceive.

Pop-ups are highly disruptive and whenever I work on something that involves a modal window, let alone a pop-up, I ask myself if it's truly needed. I'd argue they're all the more disruptive for non-technical people-- especially if they aren't savvy to dark patterns and may not know how to dismiss particularly pernicious pop-ups (A tiny X in a subdued color located in one corner may be extremely easy to miss at first glance)

Event if that was true, what are the odds non-technical people are looking for a browser extension to track their remote work hours?

I wrote something more automatic for myself. I ask the Google Calendar API how many hours I spend in meetings that week. From that I calculate how many working hours I have for other things. I then use the WakaTime API to get how many hours I spent working already (making sure to not double count during meetings). WakaTime can track my editor usage, terminal usage and work in Chrome (e.g. PR reviews). I use a separate Chrome profile to make sure I only track work-related browsing time, and Choosy to open links to our company GitHub automatically in the work profile. I show a summary of the time spent and left in my terminal prompt. Overall really happy with it!

Just for my interest: Would you use Waywo if it would work with WakaTime (as that came up as Feature Request more often)

I’ve noticed that my office is working more now that we’re all remote

Less time wasted on meetings ?

Perhaps it's because people focus better in their personal environment?

It's actually an opposite in remote-friendly companies - more time is wasted in meetings using corporate video conference software.

I’ve worked remote for about 12 years. I can count the number of video conference meetings I’ve had in that time on one hand. I could also cut off both my hands and still count the number I’ve had.

Hint: it’s zero.

Remote working won’t fix stupid management decisions.

I personally really like RescueTime (https://www.rescuetime.com), does all of the tracking automatically and allows for custom categorization and productivity settings. Been using it for many many years, they've been keeping up, even added a mobile version a couple years back.

I swear by https://timingapp.com/ it's almost frictionless to track time. I've been using it at work for over 2 years daily now, and I don't even use the results anymore.

+1 Have been using it for a few months and it's given me great insights on how I use (waste) my time. I especially like the fact that it's practically out-of-the-box zero-configuration tracking. Highly recommended.

Wrote a prototype for something like this years ago but don't know enough frontend stuff to take it to production. The big difference is there was a certain amount of randomization to the survey prompt. And had some calendar functionality so as not to ask during scheduled meetings. And allowed you to set some top-level strategy/goals, so that the question "what are you working on now / how bout now / etc" could include a bit more context around core workstreams. Wanted to avoid typical taskmaster PM or GTD approaches that skew toward micromanagement, while still maintaining a general sense of measurable progress.

"Never loose any of your entries"

Lose.

Thanks!

Since 2010 or so, I am using the hamster applet under Gnome. Combined with low-tech "paper", it has served me and my customers really well[1].

The Hamster project do not have a single homepage, thus the "search" link.

[0]: https://duckduckgo.com/?q=gnome+hamster+tracker

[1]: https://www.ceondo.com/ecte/2018/02/10-years-home-office-lea...

One of the pros of the paid plan being "No more license key interruptions" concerns me, how often will it nag for payment? I understand needing to be paid but shouldn't nag screens be for trial periods leading to paid subscriptions not for "free" tiers?

This concern stems from the giant full screen unclosable (no X at top right) popup offering me 20% off if I buy now before I've even finished reading the landing page.

Yeah, the popup was a mistake :D Came up in other comments as well.

Waywo asks every 5th time for the license key, it is the same dialog as the tracking one and thereby not full screen. It can easily be closed again

I've been using Taskwarrior in conjunction with Timewarrior to track time spent on work tasks. I used to be skeptical about it but the whole command-line first, spartan interface does wonders at keeping me focused. Better yet: it allows to set up work hours so I don't have to stop a task whenever I'm no longer working.

I made something similar using Hammerspoon on Mac. I make a list of tasks, one per line, with a time estimate. Hammerspoon will show the active task, the time elapsed, and the estimate on top of everything using canvas. It's helped me stay on task and be more realistic with my planning. If anyone is interested I can share.

Fellow Hammerspoon user here (great tool). Yes, I'd be interested to see how you did this. Please share!

Not one comment in here is positive which saddens me. In the end, HN should encourage people to build awesome solutions. But even Dropbox got negative comments when they launched on HN, so maybe this is just how things work.

So here's my (positive) take: Great work, thanks for sharing. I especially like the design of the page, playful but still clean. AFAIK there's a similar app from toggl themselves, what are the advantages of your solution?

Thank you so much for that comment! HN has a hard audience, but I thing most points are quite valid so I will take them as feedback :D

Toggls solution is mainly for time tracking directly from the browser, so you do not have to open the app. They currently do not provide the interruption feature to ask you in (on top of) every application you are currently using.

Folks don’t even track working hours at work let alone home

i use harvest and i hate it but the toolbar app is convenient & delightfully buggy

Uuh no thanks. How about we trust employees and simply check the result of their work? Who cares if someone has spent N hours sitting in front of the screen, show me the results.

As a freelancer, you should track what you worked on when and for how long.

If the client comes back and says "you billed me for 4 hours yesterday, what did you do?" During that time you might not have something presentable yet, but you need to track what you did (which might be 'write unit tests for {featureName}"

With that said, I'd hate getting interrupted every N minutes. Personally, at the end of a work session, I stop my clock (I bill by the hour) and note any PRs, meetings, or glue-work I did during the work session.

I get that, and I feel the same, but a lot of jobs require time entries with work descriptions. I have had several of them.

Finding ways to minimize that burden on your workday is really nice. I hate time tracking.

No comment on this product specifically, I'd have to try it. But a lot of us can't just say no thanks to time tracking.

I should also add some people benefit personally from making this effort. I have ADHD and though I hate time tracking, the information it gives me is invaluable. I have a terrible sense of time (honestly almost none) and being notified of intervals and knowing what I did is an excellent aid for keeping on track and improving self awareness.

I thought I hated time tracking. Now I get to put in one time entry for my whole shift, but I have to make reports constantly on what I'm doing which is a lot more effort than just entering in chronological order what I did.

Simple time tracking helps keep you honest and tells you things you weren't aware of, in my experience.

I'm used to keeping track of every 15 minute segment of my day, at former jobs. But currently, I'm not expected to do that while working from home, but at the same time my manager wants an update every day on what I've been doing. I'd rather be monitored constantly or make a chronological log than have to engage in basically a marketing exercise every day.

I did have a salaried position once where we absolutely had to punch a time clock (and quite a few people grumbled because of the class implication) but there was almost no monitoring on a daily basis. Except you weren't supposed to fall asleep.

>but at the same time my manager wants an update every day on what I've been doing

Isn't that just a stand up?

I am not strictly speaking a developer nor do I work in a department that has developers. The weekly meeting with my manager is called a "touch base" but a daily email summary is also required, only since working from home.

Friday we had a "scrum" meeting regarding COVID-19 related work, so I guess the PMs are appropriating agile terms kind of like Wall Street bros like war metaphors.

I already feel plenty annoyed as it is with project managers (and our Jira setup) asking three times a day how things are progressing and how many hours were spent on what. Second only to games, this has got to be the fastest multiplying application category these past few years...

would you/your pm's buy a solution that would give this data without your intervention?

Me, no. Them, maybe, once they have enough meaningful work during the days to deliver them from the delusion that repeated daily check-ins during 6 week sprints is a valuable chore.

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