We use timers everywhere, and most of the time how they work is fine. But I’ve come across a slightly different need.

For those who struggle with working, and procrastinate, there is the “Pomodoro” technique which advises on setting a timer for 20 mins and commiting to focusing on work throughout that 20 mins before stopping for a break.

I like this and have used it a couple of times to just get going on a project, but this use case actually means a normal timer is often not quite the right thing.

The difference is a normal timer’s function is to tell you when a given amount of time has passed, whereas what case needs to do is to tell you when a certain amount of time has not yet passed.

This subtle change in emphasis has led me to look at my standard phone timer and consider changes, here is my phone’s timer app:

Android Timer

The first thing I think I can do without is showing the time remaining at all. I like the bar around the edge, but if we limit the max time to 1 hour then we can show it like a clock, with a 20 minute countdown starting from the 4pm position, for example.

We don’t need a notification the time is over, we might be working away and would do better without an interruption, so no sounds when it’s over.

I ended up with this:

My Timer

The middle dot goes green when the time is up.

You can download it from my github

It was an entertaining couple of hours making this, trying a few different ideas and learning about SVG paths. I’ve been meaning to do something with SVGs for years. I’m on a bit of sabatical at the moment, so it’s been the perfect time.

It’s such a strange feeling using it and not seeing a number ticking down, I’ve decided it’s the number that makes for some stress and urgency, if you just show it like this, it’s still accurate.