How do I take a break?

[bynt]

I can't seem to get the concept of taking a break in super-productivity. When finishing the day, I sometimes find this in the overview:

Breaks (nr / time)
1 / 0:05

But I don't know, why the time is shown there. So I'm wondering what constitutes to a non-pomodoro-break. I guess that not tracking time helps..but what else is needed to tell the app that I was off the screen for some time? Dismissing idle time does not contribute to breaks afaics.

I found <button (click)="trackAsBreak()" [..] </button> in super-productivity/src/app/features/time-tracking/dialog-idle/dialog-idle.component.html, which seems to incorporate what I am looking for, but I don't see this button in the web app (and the self hosted (podman) app). Is this just a feature of the desktop app? If so, how do breaks show up in the web app?

@johannesjo and all contributors: thanks for this awesome piece of work

[johannesjo]

Thanks for your question. Breaks are counted when you choose "Break" or "Task & Break" from the idle dialog. You can enable idle handling from the settings, though this requires the extension to be installed for the browser version. An idle dialog is opened whenever you do not do anything at the computer (no mouse move, no keyboard interaction) after the specified amount of time.

Choosing "I already did" from the "Take a break" banner also counts as a 5 minute break.

Resetting the "Without break" timer via the little button next to it does NOT count as break.

[leorochael]

What about a permanent cup button at the top bar? It could also immediately jump to the next break in the pomodoro sequence.

[johannesjo]

This is a good suggestion @leorochael ! I can see this added as an opt in feature. I wouldn't want to show this for new users though, to keep things as simple as possible.

[dylandhall]

I really prefer manually setting focus times instead of going full pomodoro (i find it a bit too proscriptive - when i'm in flow i want to keep going without mandatory breaks!) but i would love a feature where i can set a 5 or 10 minute timer for a break. i find breaks a lot more relaxing when i'm not worried about how much time may have passed, if i know i'll get a notification when it's time to get back to work i can check out for a bit without keeping an eye on the clock.

Edit: I can see this is covered by an issue in the backlog! I'll see if i can pick it up, just can't be this week..

[fabiante]

@johannesjo You two first answers are 3 years apart, can you please clarify:

2021: Currently the only way to take a manual break is by hovering over the icon near "Without a break" in the today list and clicking it. I know that this is not ideal, but haven't found a better concept on how to deal with this so far.

2024: Resetting the "Without break" timer via the little button next to it does NOT count as break.

[johannesjo]

@fabiante in 2025 the only way to have a break counted, is to select it from the break reminder banner or when through the idle time dialog. :)