The link is vaguely related, but this post was not prompted by it - I just wanted to have some link to the state of the art:
Five free apps to help remind you to take a break - TechRepublic:
Like many folks, I sit too much working at my computer.
I have an activity monitor, my Basis Watch. It tracks how long I sit still. In the past few weeks, I have still for as long as 4.5 hours at a stretch - that's absolutely still, in my chair at my keyboard, typing. Nearly every day I sit still for 2 or 3 stretches of 2 hours. Basis allows you to set a goal - "Don't Be A Sitter: from 9-5, get up every N hours." I currently have the goal set at 2 hours - because whenever I move it lower, say 90 minutes, it gets depressing.
I have tried setting alarms to remind myself to get up and work. Right now I have alarms set at 11:30, 2:00pm, and 3:30pm. Why so irregular? See below.
This post was prompted by my 11:30 alarm going off. Unnecessarily, because I had just been active, walking over to a coworker's desk.
Having the alarm go off unnecessarily is irritating. Having it good just as I am settling back at my desk to get back to work disrupts my concentration, breaks my flow. Having the alarm go off when I am 30 or 45 minutes into a good working period, into flow, really pisses me off. I have this theory that interruptions while you are in the middle of a critical b it of work, several things up in the air, in your head, is one of the primary causes of bugs.
What I want is an alarm, a reminder, to get up and move around, that is not at an absolute time. What I want is an alarm that occurs, say, an hour from the last time I got up and moved around. An alarm that is smart enough to reset itself
More: I want an alarm, a reminder, that is smart enough to detect (by some heuristic) if I am in flow or not. (Hmm, I wonder if my Basis watch can reliably distinguish typing. It's accelerometer is on my wrist, after all. Since I am a hunt and peck typist, 60wpm, but 80% right handed, I might have to move my watch from left wrist to my right wrist.)
A reminder that is smart enough to try to look for a period to notify me, after I have been working for an hour, but before I have been working for 2. Looking for a period where I am not working intensely. Possibly looking fior a period where I am not typing intensely - or possibly looking at what I am actually doing, whether I am working, or in Blogger (like now). Which is smart enough to look for a good period to interrupt me. But which might interrupt me no matrter what I am doing after 2 hours of sitting.
You know those prtoducts that try to wake you up at a good point in your sleep cycle? e.g. http://www.sleeptracker.com/how-it-works/
What I want is a product that interrupts me at a good point in my work cycle.
(Ideally it might be smart enough not to interrupt me when I am in a meeting. )
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Smart alarms when you are awake.
Smart alarms when you are workuing.
Smart alarms should not just be for sleep.
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(Possibly it could have the sort of incremental alarm feature that a dawn simulator has. A low priority background notification that ramps up gradually.)
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OK, I should just go ahead and write it myself. I installed Tasker for Android to write such scripts. I am not a big fan of Tasker - stupid graphical interface, but worse, my phone battery always drains. I got the basic timer functionality working, but was not able to detect movement by accelerometer. (Blogging mwe this prompted to re-Google, and I found https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.kanetik.movement_detection_trial_premium)
