2010-12-03 00:01:05

I was wondering how Vi/blind users keep track of time while they play games and work on the computer.  I know I have a terrible track record of getting involved in a project and losing all track of time.

- Aprone
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2010-12-03 00:39:58

This is very individual, I would guess, but I can tell you what it's like with me. If I sit down to play a game or work on my own, or just any other project, I am hopeless, lost, caught like in a web, and I am about to face some trouble later on. LOL
Lukas

I won't be using this account any more or participating in the forum activity through other childish means like creating an alternate account. I've asked for the account to be removed but I'm not sure if that's actually technically possible here. Just writing this for people to know that I won't be replying, posting new topics or checking private messages until the account is potentially removed.

2010-12-03 02:43:34

I personally set the hourly chime on my talking clock, so that each hour it says the time.

I then think "oh, ----- so it's eleven O.clock is it? I really ought to think about stopping and sleeping now, ---- I'll just ----"

And do this pretty much on any subsequent hour until i actually fall asleep.

I'd like a west minster chiming clock, ---- but more for the style points than because I actually think it would be useful ;D.

As regards "timing things though" John Banic of 7-128 software actually put together a great free talking timer program which I pretty much use whenever I'm cooking, ---- it's ven called dark timer.

Hope this explains things.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2010-12-03 02:54:55

Dark, do you happen to have a link to the talking timer?  I'd like to check it out.

- Aprone
Please try out my games and programs:
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2010-12-03 19:28:37 (edited by Aprone 2010-12-03 19:30:58)

I was making a new computer timer for my wife, and I took an extra few minutes to make it Vi/blind accessible.  I haven't found any of the existing accessible timers so I can't really say whether mine is good or bad by comparison.  Here it is in case anyone wants to give it a try.

www.kaldobsky.com/audiogames/TimeReminder2.zip  (1.11 MB)

When you run it, as long as the window has focus you can just type to set it.  Typing Help lists the commands.  Not like you'd ever need it, but you can have up to 50 timers set at once (within the same program).  You can set alarms for a relative amount of time, for a specific time of the day, or set it to chime periodically. 

It is as easy as typing "in 2h40m" to set an alarm that will go off in 2 hours and 40 minutes.  If you don't want to forget about some place you need to be, you can type "at 8:45 pm" for an alarm that will sound at 8:45 this evening.  You can also say, for example, remember to check on something every 10 minutes by typing "every 10m".

I didn't design it to support months, but you can set an alarm that won't sound for weeks and weeks rofl!  You can swap out the wav files for other alarm sounds too if you like.  I recommend typing "Help" for a complete list of commands though, since I'm sure I'm not thinking of them all right now.  Enjoy.  big_smile

- Aprone
Please try out my games and programs:
Aprone's software

2010-12-04 07:04:02

wow,those features sounds cool.But I have a question.Say if I set an alarm for 8 30 pm,today,will it go off on 8 30pm every day?Thanks.

Of all sad words of tongue or pen, the saddest are these, ‘It might have been.
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2010-12-04 10:24:36

grryfindore, nope it would only go off once.  I suppose I should have added an option for an alarm to go off every day at a certain time.  Oh well, you'll just have to type "at 8:30pm" each day.  tongue

- Aprone
Please try out my games and programs:
Aprone's software

2010-12-04 11:21:33

Hi aprone.

I'm going to be cooking chilly tomorrow, which takes 7 and a half hours in my slow cooker (but makes amazing chilly), so will test your timer out then.

the Dark timer I mentioned by john Banic can be found at http://www.7128.com/resources.html

the only slight problem currently is the timer depended upon some basic java tools which get installed with either their games or demos, but they're rejiggering their demos at the moment so you can't download them unfortunately you certainly don't need to buy their actual games for this to work, you could use expired demos if you wished.

I'll ask John about including the tools bit in the download for dark timer so that it can be accessed without the need for the 7-128 demos, ---- that's assuming he hasn't seen this topic already of course.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2010-12-07 21:52:59

Ok guys, if you download the program again it now has a few new features. If you type in a specific time that is earlier than the current time, the timer now understands that you mean tomorrow. If you want to customize an alarm sound, you can type alarm # filename.wav and the alarm number you choose will have that alarm sound. This will make it easier for you guys to pick different sounds for different alarms. Finally, in addition to the timers there are marks. Type mark to create a mark and the program will remember the date and time it was made. Later on you can type say marks (to hear them all) or type say mark # for a specific one. The mark will tell you how long it has been since you created the mark, so it can be used as a timer.

- Aprone
Please try out my games and programs:
Aprone's software

2010-12-09 20:44:28

I actually made one of these for myself a couple years ago, but stoppped using it when my computer with the full version of jaws died...
Although, for the past week or so I've been falling asleep without turning off the computer, so this might be useful again. ^_^

I have a tendency to check the time rather absently if I've got Jaws running... half the time I don't even pay attention to what time it was, though!
And since I'm running the demo, now, it tends to shut off if I'm playing games on the computer. To make matters more complicated, my talking clock has a bad habbit of resetting itself when it receives a jolt, and I have no idea how to set the thing... and am never up and thinking about smacking it into shape at midnight. ^_^
If I desperately need to check the time, I'll run to my PACMate.
When I was using Blazey notetakers, I used the built-in alarms and hourly chimes quite a lot... the PACMate alarms don't really work for me as well, though. So I might give this program a try.

看過來!
"If you want utopia but reality gives you Lovecraft, you don't give up, you carve your utopia out of the corpses of dead gods."
MaxAngor wrote:
    George... Don't do that.

2010-12-10 14:57:54

hi,
Can you send an other timer? It is ver'r'r'r'r'ry hard.

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2010-12-10 21:23:00

I'm not sure what you're asking burak.  Can you rephrase your question?

- Aprone
Please try out my games and programs:
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2010-12-11 00:41:45

This timer is verry hard. Can you sent to an other one if you have?

I post sounds I record to freesound. Click here to visit my freesound page
I usually post game recordings to anyaudio. Click here to visit my anyaudio page

2010-12-11 11:04:55

I  think he's finding the command-prompt style interface confusing. Well, not surprising and understandable considering he's still learning english.

<Insert passage from "The Book Of Chrome" here>

2010-12-11 11:55:26

That makes a lot of sense.  I don't think there's much I can do unless I translate the help section and commands.

- Aprone
Please try out my games and programs:
Aprone's software

2010-12-31 13:40:18

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2010-12-31 15:57:49

Awwe, I was expecting a "I like to learn about general purpose timers and clocks" post. I didn't think this title was too complicated, but it apparently stumped the bot.

Hm, cyprus makes me think of the tree. Is it a place?

(To a moderator: Is it bad to reply to a bot like this? I mean... this is certainly better than the E-yelling I used to do at them, but ... ? )

看過來!
"If you want utopia but reality gives you Lovecraft, you don't give up, you carve your utopia out of the corpses of dead gods."
MaxAngor wrote:
    George... Don't do that.

2010-12-31 18:49:08

Aprone,
Did you consider making it into a gui interface? Most of us have screen readers anyway and interpreting guis could be much easier than using a command line. That could solve that problem

<Insert passage from "The Book Of Chrome" here>

2010-12-31 19:02:57

I suppose a gui interface might be a nice addition.  The one I had made for myself years ago has a gui so I specifically worked to build this one without one.  This might be one of those situations where I misjudged what would be useful and what wouldn't.  smile

- Aprone
Please try out my games and programs:
Aprone's software