Where does your time go every day? I created a web app to track it!
Hi Indie Hackers!
My name is Brendan and I've been working on 144blocks over the past few months. It was inspired by a blog post on Wait But Why (link in comments) that details breaking your day into 10-minute blocks of time to see where it's all going.
I'm still flushing out the designs (especially on mobile) and have a few bugs to track down but I would love some initial feedback on the site. What's great? What's terrible?
Is there any data on how you spend your time over a day/week/month that you would like to see here and that would make the site more sticky to have users coming back on a daily basis?
I have yet to monetize it but my plan is to make a "Pro" version that would allow users to create custom activities and dashboards that are unique to their daily habits.
Thanks so much for the help!
Brendan
Awesome!
The gif also explains it nicely... BUT wtf do I need to sing up for? ;-)
Of course you're free to keep it that way but just wanted to give you an alternative perspective. If it would not require a signup upfront but rather below the gif I can just start or a Button leads me to just start I would be VERY tempted to fill out the blocks for my personal time... just like in the gif. I want to do this!
But what about emails, you're asking...
Let's put it this way: Once a user (me) has spent 10-20 minutes clicking around and specifying my personal day I have invested a big ammount of trust and my time into your app. You could then
Yes, good suggestion. I didn't sign up because I was hoping to give it a go before having to do so. Sort of like this website — I was able to read Indiehacker posts even before signing up.
I didn’t sign up to but I bookmarked :)
Totally agree (especially with "awesome" part!). Once I entered the website, I looked onto the gif, and I liked the idea, but the inner guilt in me that I spend too much time procrastinating puts me off too much to continue with signing up. It's like I'm trusting you to tell me that I'm wasting my time too much, even though that's not the point of the app.
The easier it is to start entering data the better, because I think many users would also be coming to your app with a similar guilt, and they need to be nudged as much as possible into entering the data.
Great feedback, thank you @il
Thanks Patric, I appreciate the feedback. I've had a few people mention to me now that I should allow users to begin adding blocks before asking them to sign up and I love the idea. In all honesty, the only reason I haven't implemented this feature yet is that I built the initial prototype with a sign in required, and I haven't prioritized implementing a no signup required page yet... other features/bugs keep taking up my time. Hearing it reiterated, again and again, makes me want to prioritize this sooner rather than later... thanks again!
Yes I really think you'd do yourself a big favor - not repelling visitors and still having a shot at their contacts...
It's an interesting visualization. What might make it a more interesting exercise for me is to see how my blocks compare to those of other people. The most obvious one that comes to mind is Benjamin Franklin's daily schedule: https://thefocuscourse.com/franklin-schedule/
The writer in me thinks it has the makings of an interesting interview series, asking a range of notable folks (athletes, teachers, anyone on a night shift) how they spend their day, or to elaborate on their 144 blocks.
I really like this idea, thanks! I definitely think it would add a layer of interest if you were able to compare your schedule to others. I'm going to look to find and mock out a few famous people's schedules to let users see how those people spend their days.
There's a wealth of resources to find out the "famous people's schedules" bit.
My personal favorite is this one: https://digitalsynopsis.com/inspiration/famous-creative-routines/
https://wheniwork.com/blog/famous-people-schedules-infographic/
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2013/oct/05/daily-rituals-creative-minds-mason-currey
Thanks for sharing these links - I'm going to save them for when I begin looking into building this in more detail.
I like this app! How did you build it?
Thanks @albertkim - the site is built with React/Redux on the client. I'm using Firebase Cloud Firestore for my DB, and hosting the app through Firebase as well.
I had thought of a Chrome extension of Calendar add-on for this some time ago. The idea was based on better categorization and reporting on items in Google Calendar and then being able to see results over time and compare with others.
Then Google bought a company that had the same tech and decided not to go that route.
Biggest challenges identified were the laziness of people who say they want to track their time.
Am I supposed to use your tool before or after the day or a bit of both? I definitely think the idea is useful. There are some competitors out there, but so what?
I think that would depend on the individual. The way I've been using it is a combination of throughout the day and at the end of the day. I've gotten some suggestions to have a future feature where you can plan a day ahead of schedule and then use that plan to see how you actually spent your time that day so that may be a way people use it before the day begins.
@natalieob asked me about using something like this recently.
@natalieob have you had a chance to try it out? I would love any feedback 😄
This is really cool—I loved that article!
Thanks @laurealbouy 😄
Very cool. Signed up. However I found the way of selecting blocks to be hard. Didn't get the drag. Need a search bar on the activities so I can enter a few letters of the one I am looking for.
Thanks for the feedback @joshdance I've been planning on implementing a search bar for the activities so that's definitely on my radar.
In regards to finding the blocks difficult to select... were you on desktop or mobile? Was it hard to see what times you were picking? Any suggestions on how I can make this easier or more intuitive?
Thanks!
I am on desktop Chrome.
I would do some sort of selection mode. Like clicking the box lights it up, then moving the mouse lights up the other boxes.
Or a quick gif tutorial for the first time etc.
Thanks @joshdance - how did you find the gif on the landing page? Would it beneficial to have another one once a user signs in as well to reinforce how to use it?
I've been interested in this kind of tracking before and used Toggl (I think) for a few weeks to keep track of everything. It took a lot of effort but was very rewarding to see all of the time accounted for.
That being said, I had a hard time getting deep insights from the data and, like I mentioned, it took a lot of discipline.
I'm interested in hearing what have been your thoughts on overcoming these two barriers?
Those are interesting points @sky, thank you! I've been looking into Toggl too to get some inspiration.
In regards to the effort in keeping track of everything, I want this tool to be as seamless and easy to use as possible. Ideally, I wouldn't want users spending more than 5 minutes a day inputting their blocks. I'm going to continuously look to improve the flow of adding the blocks so it becomes as intuitive as possible. Do you have any suggestions as a first time user into how the process would be easier for you to use?
I too, am looking to craft better stories from the data that users are inputting. I really love looking at the "Weekly Recap" towards the end of the week and seeing either how consistent or inconsistent I was at a certain activity... here's my weekly recap for this week:
https://imgur.com/LsJezKr
In the future I would love to add data on either how a user's day/week/month is vs the average user, or allow users to set goals for how much time they want to allocate to certain things and let them reflect back and see if they hit those goals.
Thanks again for the feedback!
As a single data point, this is the opposite of my desires and experience. I added blocks throughout the day, not in one sitting at the end. This not only increased the granularity and accuracy of my timekeeping but also made me more mindful of my time throughout the day. I personally viewed it as a benefit.
I’ve seen this mentioned elsewhere in the thread, but the ease with which I can add very specific blocks is my number 1 concern (because I spend so much time adding blocks throughout the day). I should be able to add the exact amount of the right blocks quickly on both desktop and mobile. It should be accurate, lightning fast, and intuitive. If you can make it a delightful experience, I’d happily spend all day in your app. I don’t have all of the implementation details clear in my head, but those are definitely my desires as a potential user.
It would be great if it were easy to add custom blocks. If I have to struggle throughout the day to classify what I’m doing, it increases my chances of app fatigue.
From a company stand point, you want users adding good, accurate data so they can experience the benefit of time tracking. If they slap down hour-long chunks of generic blocks at the end of the day, I would guess you’ll have a hard time helping them find actionable insights and returning to the app day after day.
This makes the most sense for my use case. Also, seeing the macro breakdown (i.e. I slept for X hours, I ate for X hours, I worked for X hours, etc) can give me a general idea of how balanced my life is.
Anyways, there’s a handful of my thoughts. I hope it helps or gives you another perspective to consider. Good luck!
Thanks so much for this detailed response. I 100% agree that the easier the core functionality of the app, adding blocks is, the more sticky I can make it for returning users. I think the best way for me to do that is to sit with people who haven't used it yet and really see where the pain points come from.
I really love the idea of allowing users to set goals before the week begins (ie: I want to write for 7 hours this week) and allow them to compare it to how they're actually doing once there blocks are filled in
The arrow obfuscates a lot of the text on FF58.0.2 (64-bit)
https://imgur.com/a/6h6Pn
Thanks for the image - I believe I know what the bug is... was this screenshot taken in Mozilla?
That's right, Firefox Quantum 58.0.2 (64-bit)
Should be all fixed now - thanks for pointing that out.
This is awesome. Huge potential for PWA here as well on mobile. Definitely get rid of the login gate though.
Thanks Nick - going to look to get rid of the login gate over the next few days after getting so much feedback on it.
Nice job on the website, just my opinion but i think allowing giving the user access to a custom block that they can name and to choose the color of that block should be a standard feature. Once that block is created it should be auto saved on their profile. For example, "Work" is very generic and fills up the majority of most of our days. Personally i would want to break that down to many of the various projects i am working on and see the time i invest in each one.
Thanks @TibbyBad - this is definitely a feature I have on my radar. I'm still debating whether to add it as a standard feature or one that would be bundled with a "Pro" version.
Do you have any plans to automate some of this so it's not such a manual task? Clicking 144 boxes each day may become tedious for most users. How does it differ from RescueTime?
I would love in the future to allow users to set a “default” day or things they do everyday at the same time to make it quick and easy to add - thanks for the suggestion and feedback.
I would also suggest GPS tracking for auto filling work, school and commuting
Very nice!
Thank you!
Blog post that inspired the idea:
https://waitbutwhy.com/2016/10/100-blocks-day.html