org-mode
When I was a contractor I used to generate my invoices using it.
Ask HN: How do you track your work hours?
21–30 of 40 posts
Re: Ask HN: How do you track your work hours?
#22Been doing solo gamedev since 2020, here’s my time tracking habit.
Goals: make predictable progress each day, get a feel for how long different types of tasks take, and to have guilt-free rest after a day is “done”.
So I decided I’ll aim to work just 3 hours on weekdays, 2 hours on weekends, but I must first write down my current subgoal in a text file and note every time I stop or start.
So this file is full of things like “15:03-15:20, 15:55-16:00 Make minigun emit a puff of steam when it stops”. Conveniently reused as a git commit message. GPT made me a sublime text plugin that adds up the total, and I have inserting current clocktime as a mey binding.
I’m only allowed to work towards that subgoal as fast as I can with no distractions.
The goal must lead to a releasable update, otherwise it does not count. So in my system I’ve defined doing taxes or checking email as not work but a chore (like washing the dishes), to make sure I prioritize releasing stuff.
If I want to check HN or something, then I need to take a proper break instead of semi-working. And since I need to confront this and note it, I’m less likely to do so.
Re: Ask HN: How do you track your work hours?
#23I track time for the following reasons:
- track and optimize productivity
- I have a budget per project
- ensure I work my 40h/week (if I work more or less, my productivity goes down)
https://tailordev.github.io/Watson/
- kind of a diary to help me remember what I worked on
- good "backup" where I can see where I actually spent my time on
Additionally, I have a Google sheet that I use to track how many hours a day I in worked.
Re: Ask HN: How do you track your work hours?
#24Toggl Track https://track.toggl.com/timer
Yes, plus one for toggl. I used to track my time in a text file, but this became cluttered very quickly.
Re: Ask HN: How do you track your work hours?
#25When I had multiple billable clients, I used to use org-mode and org-clock. It was really nice because I could keep really detailed track of which projects I was working on throughout the day.
I've changed jobs since then though and don't really need to know more than the total number of hours for a day, but I've been using Obsidian for that. In the yaml frontmatter, I have a 'clocks' array similar to what the clock-in/clock-out looks like from org-clock.
Re: Ask HN: How do you track your work hours?
#26Tracking time was too much hassle for me. If it takes less than 4 hours, I bill half a day, otherwise I bill a full day.
Re: Ask HN: How do you track your work hours?
#27I use an app called Time Recording: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.dynamicg.t...
I track time spent on work broken down into dozens of subtasks, which is really helpful for analysing later and estimating future work. It's easy and quick to switch tasks or retroactively adjust or track time. There are various reports you can view or export as CSV.
Re: Ask HN: How do you track your work hours?
#28QBserve on mac is one time payment works forever
I found it to be great
Re: Ask HN: How do you track your work hours?
#29I use https://wakatime.com/, which is great if you are a dev and want to get a weekly summary of how you spent your time
Re: Ask HN: How do you track your work hours?
#30I used to use Toggl Track, but would miss some updates and would need to go back and update, so last week I used chatGPT to make a basic chrome extension to `prompt` in asking what I am working on every 30 minutes and append to a google sheet. Then it generates a pivot table of tasks and number of hours per day.