# Put phone away box

**URL:** <https://forum.beeminder.com/t/put-phone-away-box/12554>\
**Category:** Tech\
**Created:** [October 8, 2025, 8:33pm UTC](https://forum.beeminder.com/t/put-phone-away-box/12554 "2025-10-08T20:33:57Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 3

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**Author:** ![skorytnicki](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/forum.beeminder.com/skorytnicki/32/4204_2.png) [@skorytnicki](https://forum.beeminder.com/u/skorytnicki)\
**Post date:** [October 9, 2025, 6:42am UTC](https://forum.beeminder.com/t/put-phone-away-box/12554/3 "2025-10-09T06:42:41Z")

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I discarded some other options, for example reporting time manually each week or each day.

Another discarded idea, that’s free to implement: you can achieve the same result with just Shortcuts app on iOS. One tap would mark a start date, second would be an end date. On tapping end, a request would be made to some simple service to calculate the minutes between them and sent to beeminder. This has some downsides; the physical element is removed and it requires you to interact with a phone to get your score. It has to work the other way. I can’t be in a state of “I can’t wait to interact with a phone to increase my score on Beeminder”.

> [@Is Total Buffer a better metric than Urgency Load?](https://forum.beeminder.com/t/is-total-buffer-a-better-metric-than-urgency-load/10935/11):
>
> Most folks here are motivated by brrr number go up (and realize it!)

As I mentioned in the first post, the same usb-checking script can run on your laptop - but then you have to have your laptop with even bigger screen turned on. That’s what makes Raspberry a good option.

Nonetheless, don’t feel discouraged by technical details as I’m going to share numbers (baseline + result) as well.

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