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Using the Pomodoro Technique? Time Yourself With Tomatoi.st

Simon Mackie — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 23:00:17 +0000

If you’re using the Pomodoro Technique (a method that uses a timer to help improve concentration and focus that Meryl wrote about recently) you might like to check out Tomatoi.st, a simple but nicely designed web app that can time your pomodoros and your breaks. Just hit the relevant button to start a pomodoro, a short break or a long break, and the counter will let you know how long you have to go. When the time is up, a “ding” sound is played to let you know it’s time to finish.

Tomatoi.st is a free service. No login or account is required, but when you first visit the site, you are assigned a unique URL so that you can leave your timer and come back to it later. You can also rename this URL to something a bit more memorable, like “http://tomatoi.st/simon.”

While using a real kitchen timer is probably more fun (especially one of the tomato-shaped ones that are pictured on the cover of the Pomodoro Technique book), not everyone happens to have one lying around — Tomatoi.st is a good online alternative.

Are you using the Pomodoro Technique?

(via @briansuda)

BubbleTimer: New Take on Time Tracking

Mike Gunderloy — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 19:00:00 +0000

There are plenty of time-tracking applications out there; we’ve reviewed more than a few over the years. But that doesn’t mean that there’s no innovation left in the field. Case in point: BubbleTimer, which wants to make tracking your time into an effective time-management tool rather than focusing solely on billable hours.

There are a couple of key features involved in this makeover. First is the utter simplicity of the product: if you ever did those “fill in the bubble with a No. 2 pencil” tests in school, you can use the BubbleTimer timesheet (and without getting graphite dust on your fingers, too). After you set up your activities, you just click to record time in 15-minute intervals.

The second useful thing here is goal tracking. For any activity, you can set a desired maximum or minimum time as a daily goal: “I want to watch TV no more than 90 minutes each day” or “I should be working on the squidbot project at least five hours a day.” As you bubble in your time, the system tracks how you’re doing on these goals; easy popup graphs give you a daily and weekly report on your progress (or lack of it).

You can also print out a more traditional tracking report if you want to use BubbleTimer to track, say, billable hours. But I suspect the product will be less used by those who want to track time back to clients (we mostly already have some solution in place) and more by those who want a watchdog on lifestyle change efforts. To make that even more effective, you can share selected times with others: imagine having your best friend able to see how long you spent watching anime every day.

BubbleTimer is free to try for up to 14 days, and $20 per year after that.

Send Yourself Reminders With Twitter Timer

Scott Blitstein — Mon, 05 May 2008 18:00:09 +0000

Like many of my fellow Web Workers, I look to Twitter as a means to communicate and stay connected with others. Recently though, I have also started looking at ways it can help me with my productivity.

That search led me to the Twitter Timer, a super handy bot that provides the virtual pat on the shoulder I need to remember to perform various tasks throughout the day. It’s super easy to use, just befriend the timer and then send it a direct message with the time delay and your details. When the time passes, it will tweet you back your info.

It’s free to use although a Twitter account is obviously required.

How do you use Twitter to be more productive?