Show HN my christmas project: Focus.app, cut off your Internet so you can focus | Hacker News Reader

Show HN my christmas project: Focus.app, cut off your Internet so you can focus

therealfocusapp.com

61 pointsbenofsky39 comments

The comment on FocusHelper's allowAllOutgoingExceptions is pretty amusing: https://github.com/benofsky/Focus.app/blob/master/FocusHelpe...

If the guy who wrote the comment ever reads this, it's "brightened". :)

ha, it looked wrong at the time, thank you :)

I'm going to start doing this

    [NSError errorWithDomain:@"User Stupid Domain" code:1 userInfo:userInfo];

https://github.com/benofsky/Focus.app/blob/master/FocusContr...

this is already available, SelfControl, its open source and I use it all the time: http://visitsteve.com/made/selfcontrol/

and freedom: http://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/27958/freedom

Isn't there an OSX app that does this?

I remember people on an extremely distracting forum using it, ultimately it doesn't work. Those same people are still spending a lot of time on that forum, they've stopped turning it on.

SelfControl

Hadn't seen that, only a pay for app (and I'm cheap :))! Anyway, Focus is tailored perfectly for me, hope some other people can find use out of it too.

Edit: Clarification (I'm sorry I can't reply to your comment, it won't let me), I meant I had only seen a pay for app and not this one.

Edit 2: (reply to comment also) also doesn't appear to have exceptions, maybe I'm wrong.

Self Control does the same thing and it's been open source on Github since March 2009.

http://visitsteve.com/made/selfcontrol/

BTW Person I replied to, changed their comment after I replied and I can no longer edit mine. Also, I was wrong about the exceptions: sorry bout that.

You may be thinking of Concentrate (http://getconcentrating.com)

Also worth noting, RescueTime has a "Get Focused" feature that blocks any sites that you have marked as unproductive (for a specified number of minutes).

Please be careful, I intentionally made there to be no easy way (it can actually be reversed in one command but not in the interface) to re-enable internet access before the timeout. Hope you like it!

Github: https://github.com/benofsky/Focus.app

I can’t seem to add an exception.

Edit: Literally clicking [+] does nothing, so there’s nothing to save. I’m also not convinced 5 is enough: I want dropbox to be connected, github, our bug tracker, our team chat, my email, and basecamp — that’s 6 already.

You have to press save or they won't be committed to the plist. Does that work for you?

Dropbox works offline, Git is a DVCS so you don't really need a connection for it (unless you're finding other projects), and if you're working you don't need email. This would work fantastically with the Pomodoro technique

Ok, quite a few people are having this problem. I'll have a fix soon hopefully!

EDIT: It's working now download the new version at: http://therealfocusapp.com/focus-alpha-0.1.app.zip — thanks to all who helped fix!

A really nice paid alternative (I use it every day) is http://getconcentrating.com/

I can confirm that this method is a pretty effective method for getting me off Twitter and on TextMate.

I actually use my hosts file, and block all the common time wasting sites I like to waste time on. There is no time period - the sites are off limits for the computer, period.

I have another computer in another room for time-wasting - with no restrictions. But sitting there is acknowledging that you're wasting time. You can't fool yourself or anyone else that you're being productive, otherwise you'd be at the 'real' computer.

I find this to be far more effective than a periodic-blocking application. Because anything you can turn off with the click of a mouse, will get turned off just when you need it the most. Editing a hosts file is a major PITA in comparison.

This cannot be turned off with a click of the mouse (see my warning below) :-) — although, one who spent 5 minutes reading the source, could turn it off! But still, not click of the mouse.

And yes, a second time wasting computer would be ideal but ye I don't have one :)

First, great app.

I use SelfControl.app, because when I need to focus, I need internet access JUST to the sites/domains/IPs I work with.

Benofsky, is there a posibility to add a whitelist of IPs/domains to this app?

You may add 5 in the settings. :)

EDIT: Thanks btw!

Superb, you should make this feature clear on the site

It looks excellent. I like the fact that you can specify an arbitrary time, whereas SelfControl restricts you to 15 minute intervals.

It would be nice if it were scriptable (which SelfControl is).

http://developer.apple.com/library/mac/documentation/AppleSc...

I don't think disabling internet connection will help you focus. If you want to focus for some time, then you will.

Also, I made something similar just a week or two ago. It doesn't disable anything, it just shows you an icon in status bar.

http://zone.codingwithlove.com

Found a small bug:

I set the default minutes to 15, yet when I go to start focusing the default appears to be 60.

I thought maybe they'd go into effect after restarting the app, but no, it still defaults to 60.

It does default to the last value of the Start Focusing form, so long as you keep the app open.

Ye there're some problems with the preferences, I'm working on it. Are you on 10.6.5 by any chance?

Does anything like this exist for Windows?

My computer comes with this built in: http://cl.ly/3sRk

Seems similar to Freedom: http://macfreedom.com/

ifconfig down; sleep 100000; ifconfig up (add parameters as needed) Does this need an app?

Click a button or type all of that or run a shell script, hmm. I would clicking the pretty buttons.

This app seems to work.

Ok, turn the previous command into a shortcut. Done!

Does your solution support: ifconfig down except (site-a.com, site-b.com, site-c.com, site-d.com, site-e.com)

Don't quote me on the exact syntax (I do know the syntax for iptables):

ipfw add allow tcp from site-a.com to any http; ipfw add allow tcp from site-b.com to any http; ipfw add allow tcp from site-c.com to any http; ipfw add deny ip from any to any; sleep $HOWEVERLONG; ipfw flush;

I guess the other way would be simply to do ifconfig up when you need a site and take it down again. I don't tend to use such methods because if I'm really susceptible to distraction something else will distract me anyway. I think that self-discipline could be better (when the urge comes to load twitter, just don't do it).

When I opened it, I didn't realize it went to my toolbar. If you want this to be used by a broader audience you should have a "run once" to let people know how to use it.

good idea, thanks!

Yeah completely agree. I was looking everywhere, opened it twice, then, scratching my head glanced randomly @ the tool bar. The prod version will certainly need some sort of pointer to what's going on re: this. Config wizard or similar i guess

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