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Busy Status Bar

(busy.bar)
1366 points aleksi | 9 comments | 14 Oct 24 15:19 UTC | HN request time: 0.001s | source | bottom
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Aurornis ◴[14 Oct 24 23:58 UTC] No.41843535[source]▶
This is at least the 3rd version of this product idea that I’ve seen in the past decade. Certainly the nicest design!

The first time I saw this was some friends of friends who were trying to make it into a startup. They quickly discovered that their users liked the idea of a busy light for the office, but didn’t like to update it on or off throughout the day. So after the first few days people just defaulted to leaving it marked as “busy”. Within a week or two their coworkers realized that the light was always on busy, so they started asking if they were really busy.

At that point, the entire busy light idea had been defeated.

This product looks more versatile. Being able to automatically tie it to meeting status or set pomodoro timers could make it more interesting.

However, I predict the same fate: Eventually people will realize the light is busy when the person isn’t really busy, and then return to the old habit of interrupting to ask if they’re busy.

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1. javajosh ◴[15 Oct 24 02:28 UTC] No.41844355[source]▶
Perhaps the real solution is to default to "busy" and only show "available" on a trigger, like web-browsing or staring into space.
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2. Pxtl ◴[15 Oct 24 02:39 UTC] No.41844404[source]▶
You'd need to have it be host specific. Stack overflow? You're researching a problem and still might be elbows deep in a problem. Bluesky or FB? Not so much.
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3. djbusby ◴[15 Oct 24 03:13 UTC] No.41844554[source]▶
Staring into space is what I do when thinking. Lots of my job is thinking. Maybe that's why folk ignored my busy indicator.
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4. GivinStatic ◴[15 Oct 24 03:48 UTC] No.41844756[source]▶
Nobody will mark oneself as not busy, either because the management might be taking note or one truly doesn't make time to be open to more work.

It looks like to me that due to previous solutions, people try to improve upon in the same domain. May be the premise of the solution is wrong.

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5. blitzar ◴[15 Oct 24 07:23 UTC] No.41845822[source]▶
Staring into space is when I am busiest of all.
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6. necovek ◴[15 Oct 24 10:50 UTC] No.41847193{3}[source]▶
There is a lot of space to stare at!
7. Cthulhu_ ◴[15 Oct 24 11:54 UTC] No.41847570[source]▶
What if your developer community is in those spaces, or you work for them though?
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8. Pxtl ◴[15 Oct 24 13:17 UTC] No.41848268{3}[source]▶
I was being glib and using this as basically a way of illustrating how this isn't really a practical solution. I know when I'm working hard on a difficult the "endless googling bizarre behavior" is when I'm least ready to help field ad hoc requests.
9. necovek ◴[15 Oct 24 18:40 UTC] No.41851707[source]▶
That's easily solved: make that either be "interruptible" or an indicator if you are in "deep focus" or not.

However, one does not always plan in advance to get into deep focus, so I don't really believe this problem is solveable in a useful way. Basically, we need to learn to regain focus quickly and push people away when busy.

Also, async interrupt methods are great when used properly: don't you hate it when someone pings you with "hi" or "hi, I have a question" or similar and waits for your response? Good practice is to ask a full question which allows the other side to respond when they can without interrupting.