Track what we are doing on the computer to increase working efficiency by Manic times
By Raymond on Mar 16, 2009 in Efficient life
One of the famous theories of personal development is that tasks can be grouped into 4 types, or Quadrants: I) important and urgent, II) important but not urgent, III) unimportant but urgent, IV) unimportant and not urgent. To increase the quality of life, we should spend more time on Quadrant II, cut down Quadrant IV, and not be overwhelmed by Quadrants I and III. If we want to accomplish that, the first thing we have to do is to be conscious of where and how we spend our valuable time on, so that we can evaluate the proportion of time we spend on each Quadrant, and take actions to change it. A practical but rather unrealistic way is to drop down what we have done each day on a timetable. Strong will is needed to complete such a table.
Now, if we mainly deal with our work using computer, a software called Manic times can help us to do the above task automatically. Even we may just use computer for entertainment, Manic time reminds us how much time we spend on reading news or playing computer games, so that we will not exclaim during the end of the day, “Time really flies!”
Manic times includes the following simple but important functions:
1)Show the types of program we use. IE or Firefox indicates I am doing paper research or reading news at that period. Acrobat means reading papers. Media Players shows I watched a movie that day.
2)Show when and how long we use the programs. Do we consume too much energy on Media Players? Do we always waste a lot of time during the daytime and start to cram up at night?
3)Gaps or interruptions can be revealed in the activity time bar. On the Menu bar > Tools and Settings, change the definition of “away” to 1 min of inactivity (see the figure below). When we find that there are many red narrow bars in the time bar, we should be aware that we are constantly being interrupted, perhaps by phones or colleagues, or we are too sleepy to concentrate on our work. We should then take actions to avoid the distractions or have enough rest.
Computer is an inseparable part of modern people’s life. An automatic track on our habits of using computer can keep us alert to inappropriate allocation of time.
Free download: http://www.manictime.com/
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