Re: A mobile clocking solution?

["Samuel Banya" <sbanya@fastmail.com>]

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Ah, fair enough.

Funnily enough, I kind of am in the same boat, since I have a free iPad laying around which I tried to use forever for various tasks but have wanted to beat it against a wall in terms of how locked down the stupid device is.

A bit off topic, I know.

But yeah, tried to access a samba share the other day and didn't even realize iPad doesn't support all video types unless its a some specific resolution or specific formats. Super annoying to me since I have a ton of cool art books and course videos on a drive, and maybe 30 to 40% of it, I just can't access because of this stupid fact alone.

Stuff like that irks me so much since the same task left up to a capable tablet laptop like a Thinkpad X230 Tablet running something like Manjaro with XFCE would do wonders in the same scenario. Then again, the end consumer they market these locked down devices don't care, but I personally do.

Same things goes for emulators for retro games, or just installing homebrew programs in general, it just isn't easy at all on an Apple iPad unless you jailbreak the device, which is already a kind of not-easy process to begin with. 

Its just better to start out with something that is made to tinker on instead --> Raspberry Pi with tablet screen, Android tablet flashed with custom rom, Thinkpad X220 Tablet or Thinkpad X230 tablet, etc.

Anyway, hopefully you didn't take my comment the wrong way, its just that I've been frustrated recently and have been actively looking for an alternative tablet myself :) 

Org Mode rules though, so I'm sure there's a way to solve your clocking issue for sure.

I would definitely go the capture template route though, but steal someone else's template as the syntax is a little weird if you're new to it.

On Sun, Nov 28, 2021, at 12:33 AM, Marcin Borkowski wrote:
> 
> On 2021-11-27, at 22:42, Samuel Banya <sbanya@fastmail.com> wrote:
> 
> > Lol, okay. Well then, I tried to offer some advice. Good luck with MacOS.
> 
> Well, thanks - it was actually valuable.  Also - out of curiosity - what
> gave you the impression I'm using MacOS???  Fun fact: I did once use an
> iPad (a borrowed one) for half a day, and I found the experience
> terrible enough to not come near anything Apple-related;-).
> 
> Best,
> mbork
> 
> 
> >
> > Its better to keep Emacs uncaged :)
> >
> > On Sat, Nov 27, 2021, at 7:25 AM, Marcin Borkowski wrote:
> >> 
> >> On 2021-11-26, at 22:16, Samuel Banya <sbanya@fastmail.com> wrote:
> >> 
> >> > Hey Marcin,
> >> >
> >> > There are a few options that exist, so I'm going to drop a few ideas in this email.
> >> >
> >> > *"Buy A Rooted Phone" Option:*
> >> > Why not just get a rooted Android phone with Replicant on it from eBay in the first place?
> >> >
> >> > Then, you can use Termux to ssh into a local or cloud VPS file server where you're hosting your .org files. Most people even use Dropbox (or SyncThing, whatever floats your boat).
> >> >
> >> > Worst case scenario, you can maybe just run a terminal version of Emacs on the rooted Android phone (or even your current non-rooted phone), and clock in like that.
> >> 
> >> Well, doesn't that have the same security issue I mentioned?
> >> 
> >> > If you're on iOS though... well... maybe its time to get out of the walled garden?
> >> 
> >> Of course not.
> >> 
> >> > *"Just Use A Laptop" Option:*
> >> > I'd say maybe just get a laptop, put some decent Linux distro on it, and use Emacs on that instead.
> >> 
> >> Out of question.  I need this exactly for the times when I cannot use my laptop.
> >> 
> >> > Worst case scenario, you can maybe just run a terminal version of Emacs on the rooted Android phone, and clock in like that.
> >> >
> >> > *Bash Script Approach:*
> >> > The only other thing I could think of is to do this via an easy Bash prompt to find the same files on the ssh machine. This might be preposterous to those on the list that might want to use Elisp for everything, but maybe its on a device where a Linux Bash terminal just is present by default.
> >> 
> >> That /could/ be a solution.
> >> 
> >> > *"Just Log The Time Later" Approach:*
> >> > You could always even just make org capture templates to estimate time later too.
> >> 
> >> And I think this is the way to go.  Probably also use/write some very
> >> simple time tracking app on the phone.
> >> 
> >> > *Summed Up:*
> >> > The most sane approach in my opinion, is just use a computer that can normally just use Emacs as-is. 
> >> >
> >> > Then again, this is coming from someone who respects the "Getting Things Done" method a ton, but doesn't clock in every single personal task, because I think its really unnecessary and tedious. I think this kind of clocking ideas are better suited for work based todo lists if you're trying to get things done for work or something.
> >> 
> >> I don't clock everything either, but there are some things that I do,
> >> and that's why I want a reasonable mobile solution.
> >> 
> >> > I've seen the Android apps for Emacs Org Mode demo'd on YouTube, and it looks clunky. Its nice for what it is, but yeah, I think Emacs overall is just better suited for a laptop or desktop computer since you really need to just use a keyboard to pull off most of the magic.
> >> 
> >> Of course.  I don't need Org editing etc. (well, maybe capture), just
> >> the clocking.  That seems easy enough on mobile (UI-wise)..
> >> 
> >> > Good luck with this though,
> >> 
> >> Thanks!
> >> 
> >> -- 
> >> Marcin Borkowski
> >> http://mbork.pl
> >> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> Marcin Borkowski
> http://mbork.pl
> 

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