gragus's dashboard

blank started following the idea "Intelligent timeout feature" in RescueTime.

tushar replied on October 07, 2008 05:06 to the idea "Intelligent timeout feature" in RescueTime:

This is a problem that I also had with RescueTime. In essence, RescueTime uses the computer's sense of idle, so it is not very efficient in telling me how much time I spent watching a moving, or say, looking at an answer to a problem set posted by my professor. However, I think that Gragus has a great idea here. The only thing that I would add to the idea would be to have the user able to specify short_time_out and long_time_out. If this is too complicated, could it be possible for the user to specify what the idle time out value should be?

tushar started following the idea "Intelligent timeout feature" in RescueTime.

Philipp Grunwald started following the idea "Intelligent timeout feature" in RescueTime.

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Joe replied on February 27, 2008 20:51 to the idea "Intelligent timeout feature" in RescueTime:

Gragus, this is a very cool idea to add intelligence to the idle timeout and allow users to tailor it to their needs.

Internally I fight with myself between a simple interface or offering a higher level of customization to allow advanced users to fine tune for their needs.

With the next couple of releases, you'll see some features added to the data collectors that shows that we're heading the direction of trying to satisfy both targets. Having the bare minimum "Basic" setup for new users and then even more advanced features for those users who need them.

Thanks for the ideas - keep them coming

Adam Dobay started following the idea "Intelligent timeout feature" in RescueTime.

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Tony replied on February 10, 2008 05:31 to the idea "time line view - I need an overall picture of my workday - tag chunks of time as well as apps" in RescueTime:

Brilliant. Never occurred to us. A thousand thanks. We're still going to crack the java nut eventually tho!

Tony marked one of gragus' replies in RescueTime as useful. gragus replied to the idea "time line view - I need an overall picture of my workday - tag chunks of time as well as apps".

Tony marked one of gragus' replies in RescueTime as useful. gragus replied to the idea "time line view - I need an overall picture of my workday - tag chunks of time as well as apps".

gragus replied on February 10, 2008 04:35 to the idea "time line view - I need an overall picture of my workday - tag chunks of time as well as apps" in RescueTime:

Here is something you could advice your users on this matter (at least for Java applications):

I use Eclipse (an IDE for Java) that runs as a Java application. I also use a dozen of other Java applications - some for work and some privately. They all used to be logged just as "Java". Now I created a number of copies of the Java executable ("java.exe" or "javaw.exe") and have renamed them: "JavaEclipse.exe", "JavaPrivateUse.exe", etc. For most Java applications it is possible to specify which of several installed JVMs they should use. Having done that I can now have all my Java applications be logged separately by RescueTime.

If you think this tip may be useful for other users, please feel free to forward it. Cheers !))

gragus shared an idea in RescueTime on February 10, 2008 04:21:

Intelligent timeout feature

Hi there!
Here is a suggestion that is really easy to implement and may lead to much more accurate stats:

In my work I have to often switch between reading and writing documents. I'd be typing for many minutes, but then I might not touch the keyboard (and mouse) for several minutes while reading. This is of course "work time". Currently RescueTime stops recording the time after (I think) 2 minutes. This way a lot of this reading time gets lost.

At the same time I have a lot of short distractions during which the time really IS idle. So how to distinguish between the two?

Say, we have the current threshold SHORT_TMOUT (of ca 2 mins) and another threshold LONG_TMOUT (of ca 10-15 mins or so). Now:

If the PC is idle for longer than SHORT_TMOUT but not as long as LONG_TMOUT, then RescueTime can assume that the user was actually reading (watching a YouTube video/listening to a track/whatever). In that case all the time should actually be counted towards the application in focus.

On the other hand, if the PC is idle for longer than SHORT_TMOUT, and is still idle after LONG_TMOUT, then RescueTime can assume that the user has really left the desk and all time beginning since the computer became idle can me miscounted.

You could also let the users set the idle thresholds so they can adapt them to their circumstances.

Btw, a great little tool you've got!

Cheers!

gragus marked one of Tony's replies in RescueTime as useful. Tony replied to the idea "Feature request: week starts on Monday option".

gragus replied on January 28, 2008 07:25 to the idea "Feature request: week starts on Monday option" in RescueTime:

Oh yes, I have found it - it is where you told it would be.
I did not found the option earlier.
Cheers))

Tony replied on January 28, 2008 03:08 to the idea "Feature request: week starts on Monday option" in RescueTime:

Hi there-

Thanks for the kind words. I _think_ we already have the feature you need. Head over to http://rescuetime.com/settings/ and in the "location" box (not the best place for it, really) you can set the start day to Monday!

gragus shared an idea in RescueTime on January 28, 2008 02:47:

Feature request: week starts on Monday option

Hi there!
First of all let me say that RescueTime is a great product. I am a developer based in Europe and Australia and I had developed a similar tool for myself a while ago. But you have taken the idea to the next level and developed a proper product. Thanks!
NOW MY REQUEST:
In most places in the world the week starts on Monday, not on Sunday. It would be great if there was an option to set this up in RescueTime. It would benefit the user community in two ways:
1) The calendar view would be much less confusing.
2) The weekly summaries would not split the weekend in two and sum up the times in the same way as we think of the calendar.