Inside the Little Plastic Castle

When I’m using my computer devices (Mac, iPad, iPhone) I tend to sit in one spot too long.

For macOS, I use Dejal Software’s Time Out utility: every 48 minutes it blanks the screen and locks out the keyboard. Even if I reboot, it ensures I take that 12-minute break (that's just an example: you can define any break schedule you like). I want the same solution for my iPhone and iPad.

The App Store offers scores of Pomodoro timers, but they just send a notification. As far as I can tell, the system tools — Focus and ScreenTime — aren’t restrictive enough. I’m not a programmer, so advising me to "write a shortcut" won’t help. Does what I want exist? Or do you know someone who could create it?

I'm here to kvell about a nifty browser extension, StopTheMadness

(Everything except the name, which I could do without. More accurately, it's GiveMeBackControl).

StopTheMadness wrests control back from websites, so I can always right-click, copy text/images, prevent opening in new pages, prevent media autoplay, and much more. Visit site for full marketing info:

https://underpassapp.com/StopTheMadness/

It's currently available for Chrome (and Chromium browsers) on Windows, Mac, Linux.

For Mac/Safari it's a full-fledged app (as now is required for Safari extensions) with even more benefits.

I can assign browsers to domains and apps to URL schemes.

The social media giants seem to optimize function for Chromium-based browsers. So in my case, I always use Brave (with its robust privacy features) for FB, IG, Twitter, Tumblr, Reddit, Gmail and YouTube. Any cookies left by those sites are isolated to those sites, with my principal work remaining in Safari.

URL schemes means I control which apps open feed://, mailto: etc.

It also offers domain-specific implementation of styles if I use the Safari style sheet option -- it's not a full replacement for Tampermonkey yet, but who knows? The dev, Jeff Johnson, has been steadily adding features.

Sadly, it's not available for iOS (yet?)

When I began computing, everything was dark mode: green pixels on a gray-green screen. ( (just like this one, resting on two mighty 158k floppy disk drives on an Apple IIe) )

I was thrilled when the Mac showed up with black on white! So much easier on the eyes! I was mystified and repelled when Adobe products began showing a dark UI. Now it’s the hot new thing--the next version of iOS will offer it.

I learned a lot from TidBITS’s deep dive into why dark mode isn’t actually that much easier on the eyes.

https://tidbits.com/2019/05/31/the-dark-side-of-dark-mode/

The full article discusses the science of visual perception, and acknowledges its conclusions are relevant to typical eyesight. Some people’s vision requirements are different, and I’m very glad that modern computer systems let us change displays to optimize for what we can see.

Last week when I was kvelling about my new glasses, killing_rose explained how rose-colored glasses minimized migraine

( My Apple devices let me create helpful tints with software )

ETA Feb 2021:

• Setting Color Filters on iOS 14
• Adjusting Screen Color Calibration in macOS

I’m here to share the good word about “quiet web reading.” ( Four approaches with step-by-step detail )