pomodoroble

pomodoroble

About

This is a programmable timer that returns detailed user data in JSON format.

Traditionally you might enter some data in a CLI prompt. With this timer you import the timer function and write a script with custom logic for generating your configuration and saving the data.

You can leverage TypeScript to enforce data quality and improve the user experience.

Simple timers

Make a file

Start a new Node.js project, install pomodoroble, and make a file index.js with the following contents.

var {pomodoro} = require("pomodoroble");

(async () => {
  let logs = await pomodoro([
    {activity: "coding", h: 1, m: 30, s: 30},
    {activity: "break", m: 10, finishUnder: true},
    {activity: "coding", h: 1},
  ]);
  console.log(logs)
  process.exit()
})();

Run the code

The pomodoro method runs a timer. Run node index.js to execute the code above.

Interactions

In the first coding block I coded for 8 seconds. I then pressed 3 on my keyboard to indicate that my focus was 3 on a scale from 0 to 9. To move the timer from one interval to the next you press a key 0-9, which is recorded as the focus field in the recorded JSON.

Once the required time passes the timer goes from red to green. When the finishUnder attribute is true, the timer starts at green and turns red when you go over time.

You can escape the process without recording by pressing ctrl+c

Recording data

When you enter a number for the final timer it finishes awaiting your call to pomodoro, logs the logs, and exits.

The numbers you entered are now your focus ratings. The start and end field are ISO strings that record the start and end time of the activity interval.

I recommend saving these off to somewhere (file system, server) in a format that is convenient (JSON, CSV, etc.).

[
  {
    activity: 'coding',
    start: 2021-03-03T23:02:18.820Z,
    end: 2021-03-03T23:02:26.963Z,
    focus: 3,
    goalSeconds: 5430,
    loggedSeconds: 8.143
  },
  {
    activity: 'break',
    finishUnder: true,
    start: 2021-03-03T23:02:26.963Z,
    end: 2021-03-03T23:14:36.559Z,
    focus: 4,
    goalSeconds: 600,
    loggedSeconds: 729.596
  },
  {
    activity: 'coding',
    start: 2021-03-03T23:14:36.559Z,
    end: 2021-03-03T23:14:41.960Z,
    focus: 5,
    goalSeconds: 3600,
    loggedSeconds: 5.401
  }
]

pomodoroMaker

This is a utility function to create patterns of timers.

var { pomodoro, pomodoroMaker } = require("pomodoroble");
//6 1hr intervals of code
const intervals = pomodoroMaker({
  activity: "code",
  blocks: 6,
  blockLength: { h: 1 },
  breakLength: { m: 10 },
});
// Give ourselves a lunch
intervals[3] = { activity: "lunch", m: 40, finishUnder: true };

(async () => {
  let logs = await pomodoro(intervals);
  console.log(logs);
  process.exit();
})();

TypeScript

You can see how I'm currently using the software in usage/scripts. At time of writing it looks roughly like this:

Both pomodoro and pomodoroMaker take a generic that will type the activity parameter. This provides both data validation (see image above) and auto-completion.