I think there is a fix for that as well, I use Focus modes to hide work apps outside 09h-16h, so there are absolutely no mentions of productivity (or badges/things that need me to do something) to be seen when I'm not on the clock.
When I am working, I am never far from my laptop, why would I install productivity app on my smartphone in the first place? When I was part of an on call shedule, the only app I would accept would be the one pushing the notification like pagerduty.
I also found out the hard way a decade ago that having access to productivity apps such as outlook usually meant to enroll your smartphone as a device managed by your IT and it was a big no to me.
Came here to make a related comment. I've had the equivalent settings active on my GrapheneOS device for at least a couple years, and I still find myself losing hours of my life to the darn thing.
If you don't go after the underlying reason you want to distract yourself from real life by entering the portal in your pocket, all the tips and tricks in the world won't fix the problem.
Although it could be argued that the question does not make a lot of sense. A browser is a tool. Is a kitchen knife a murder weapon? Not per se, but it can be.
I guess it can be viewed as such. And at least for me it’s addictive. But HN lacks a lot of the anti-patterns that are present on Facebook, Instagram etc. I find the discussions here much more interesting and useful than viewing silly reels that are produced with the sheer purpose of being addictive. There’s also a builtin noprocrast option.
it's very low on both the "social" side and "media" side. It's mostly text, it's largely technical topics, there's commenting but it's effectively anonymous aside from a couple really well known usernames if you're a regular. no engagement algos, no following, no avatars, no obvious rampant bot activity, no fake content for views
That just means HN's community and content is more relevant to you than other social media. Social media doesn't stop being social media if you find the content interesting nor does it stop being social media if it emphasizes one form of content over the other.
Yes definitely. Again, audience and interests are different, but they are social media. Funny (sadly?) enough as a teenager I discovered IRC and was absolutely addicted and for a good 1.5 years spent every minute I could on IRC. I would use IRC at the school library between classes, at community college, at family friends' houses, in my own house, etc. We were poor at home but despite that I literally used any possible internet connected terminal to connect to IRC (and its resilience as a protocol made that really easy.) I had poor impulse control at that age but I do remember IRC a lot, and not in the most healthy way.
Also interestingly enough text-based social media (HN, Reddit, Bluesky, X) addict me way more than video based ones (like Tiktok, Youtube, or Instagram) do. I don't know if it's because it takes longer to digest the information through video than text but I do know that I have no problem with looking at pictures and videos and stopping for days/weeks, but once I get hooked on text it's really hard to stop. I even spent a year in middle school addicted to reading books though I had other things going on in my life at the time and books were a bit of an escape. I've had waves of HN addiction and definitely enjoy X and Bluesky because of the textual media of the experience.
As an adult I mostly grew out of these addictions but I can still feel their pull on me. Luckily I have enough going on in my offline life that digital life takes a backseat.
If you want to think of these in terms of "algorithms", then IRC and Usenet have a simple "chronological" algorithm to display posts while Reddit and HN use an "upvote" based engagement algorithm. X and more "modern" social networks may use more sophisticated algorithms but they're all just algorithms to return a sorted order of items.
Social media was coined in the mid 2000s to separate new platforms built on social graphs and old platforms not. But it is common now to deny any difference.
Social media was coined in the mid 2000s to separate new platforms built on social graphs and old platforms like forums. You do not follow individuals on Hacker News.
This is the only sane approach. I have reduced my smartphone to a dumb-phone just by removing the apps that suck my attention. But the worst is youtube. You can live without social media but YT has become such a cornerstone that you cannot even uninstall it.
I'm not sure I fully agree about youtube. Yes --- if you're fixing stuff, you end up having to watch youtube. But that's so bad, it's easy (for me) to continue to avoid it. Although, occasionally I do get pulled in to interesting looking videos. But when they start asking me to like and subscribe (which is often!), that's a good trigger to close the thing.
For a similar need, I turned to a small, portable device, that runs on battery (but not a laptop) to run 24/7.
I got a couple of ipads, but since I can't install some OS that I want (without jumping a million hoops).
So I got myself a HP Elite X2, second-hand, and it is GREAT. Then I wanted a second one, I couldn't find another HP Elite X2 (at the same price) so I got a Dell Latitude 2-in-1 (basically a Win tablet).
Basically I want something to run 24/5, so even if there is a power disruption (maintenance on building, etc.) my downtime would be the 2-3 minutes until my router/wifi reconnects. (we get some once every couple of weeks and a desktop wouldn't reboot)(and I didn't want a laptop as I don't want any fans/movable/mechanical components).
I've build custom base to keep them upright --> =|=|= so they can 'breathe' well, and stay cool.
I also got a KVM so I got all my devices hooked on it, so when I do need to do some work on them I can do it with my big screen/keyboard/mouse. I only remember to dust them every couple of weeks, and they are golden!
Are you talking about people who buy new hardware to replace what isn't broken, or people who expect to be able to use hardware they own within its functional capacity?
I talk about people refusing to buy one of the thousands of options available that are suited for their needs and say it is easier to lobby politicians than buying the correct device.
kome asked how to run an iPad as a personal server. Buying something that is not an iPad to use as a server instead will not make an iPad a server.
Of course lobbying politicians is an absurd path to running an iPad as a server, but the other options I know of are becoming a politician and campaigning against large corporations, or advocating for change and getting enough people to care that politicians bend to the will of the people rather than the corporations. Out of the three options, writing a check to buy legal change seems to be the easiest way.
Do you know of any other ways I haven't mentioned to use an iPad as a server? Or are you sticking to the "you're holding it wrong" approach?
> Or are you sticking to the "you're holding it wrong" approach?
Yes, I will stick to that approach. Let's move things forward, life is short. My motorcycle has a front wheel and is therefore technically a wheelbarrow. If Yamaha is not interested in helping me transform it into a functional wheelbarrow, should I lobby congress or maybe hold the president hostage, or should I go out and buy one of the many quality wheelbarrows on sale – even if none of them are from the brand Yamaha that I personally prefer?
I would love to be able to do this as well. In reality I’m afraid there are lots of obstacles in the way. Too bad really, being able to do this would be so cool.
80% of the battle is notifications but iOS really sucks at this compared to Android. On Android, I could use an app like Uber, keep the important notifications on like driver/delivery arrived but turn off all the marketing trash. On iOS all you can do is turn on or off all notifications, so if you need certain notifications from an app they get a free pass to spam you all they want :/ The entire idea of any random being able to spam messages onto your phone and make it beep without consent and fine grained control is insane.
Are time sensitive notifications new? I’ve never heard of them but the setting is there for me.
Using Uber as the example if I turn off Lock Screen notifications and turn on time sensitive notifications then will I get no marketing notifications, and only notifications about my driver turning up?
> if I turn off Lock Screen notifications and turn on time sensitive notifications then will I get no marketing notifications, and only notifications about my driver turning up?
It's up to the app developer, they get to mark notifications as time sensitive or not. So if someone decides that because a coupon is expiring soon it's "time sensitive" to ping you about it, then they can mark it as such. Hypothetically Apple could frown on this in app review, but it isn't something app reviewers are likely to be able to reliably catch.
That’s still miles away from being able to filter or categorize notifications by regexps or keywords at least. Both systems are designed for an “average idiot”, and you feel exactly like this using either. Btw, I remember that apps abused the system you mentioned or used it in a way which was annoying (e.g. a messenger not choosing my default beep for every new chat and instead using system default).
Android apps can request very powerful permissions, but those permissions are specific, explicit and revocable. There's a fundamental trade-off between power and risk, but I think the Android security model handles that trade-off quite well.
My #1 issue is that I'd love to grant an app powerful permissions if I can ensure it doesn't have internet access. But default Android doesn't expose the network permission (which exists and is accessible in ROMs like LineageOS)
Of course if this was exposed then people would start blocking the Google data vaccum - and that's bad for business
I used Uber once, then it woke me up with a notification in the middle of the following night. So I deleted it. I still have Lyft though, without problems.
iOS actually has two kinds of notifications. Normal and time sensitive (urgent). It’s app developers which abuse the mechanism. It’s not one size fits all.
Apple used to forbid advertising push notifications completely but then when they pivoted to services they started doing it themselves and eventually the hipocracy got to be too much for even them and they started allowing it with no decent way to discern them
In the Uber app, click on person icon in top-right corner, go to "Privacy and Data" tab, open "Privacy Center" and you should be able to turn off ads and promos.
I’ve never used an android phone so I’m curious… isn’t the categorization of such notifications totally up to the developer? I don’t see any other way it could work unless the OS is doing some ML on the notifications.
If I’m an app developer I could just lie and say all my marketing trash notifications are actually time sensitive/important so that you’ll still receive them. Apple has a similar thing and it’s only a soft policy (that an app reviewer would have to catch) that prevents developers from abusing it.
If it really is up to the app developer to categorize their notifications so that you can disable categories, then it sounds like it’s just a simplified way of managing individual apps’ notification preferences, no? (Not that that’s a bad thing, I wish iOS had this.)
It is up to the developers, and most of them play ball from what I've seen. What I can tell you from a user perspective is that if they don't categorize their notifications properly, I will at the very least block all their notifications, or uninstall and look for an alternative app if possible. Maybe a developer can weigh in on the incentives this behavior creates, in terms of lost engagement or userbase
> I’ve never used an android phone so I’m curious… isn’t the categorization of such notifications totally up to the developer
Yes, but any popular app will have implemented it.
> If I’m an app developer I could just lie and say all my marketing trash notifications are actually time sensitive/important so that you’ll still receive them
In those cases, your users would come to distrust your app. I reckon, only a negligible percentage of 3b Android users ever turn any notification off. More likely that some have learnt to ignore them altogether (banner blindness); swipe left to dismiss those isn't exactly as hostile as cookie banners are. Or, worse uninstall your "misbehaving" app (some are annoyed by notifications).
It's up to app developers, and some of them indeed just straight up lie with their categorization. Moovit and all dating apps come to mind. They implemented _some_ categories, but none useful – nothing that lets you separate wheat from the chaff
That's why I disabled all notifications, including the ones from taxi apps. When you think of it, they're completely unnecessary as you can track the moment of the car in (near) realtime anyway, so for these 3 minutes between ordering a car and it arriving I can live without any notifications. Also, for me the "Your driver has arrived" is not that useful anyway as I need a minute or two to actually reach the taxi starting from putting my shoes on etc., so even this notification is suboptimal.
That's not what they're talking about. On Android, notifications have a "channel". So you can disallow certain types of notifications while still allowing others through.
you're misreading the comment. this a about filtering the kind of notification from a single app.
notifications from a single app are split by category, and you can disable in the phone settings notifications from a single category will keeping the rest for a single app.
(though this categorizing is done by the app dev not you, so the dev can mix annoying stuff with the useful)
myb i wanted an iphone 6months ago but today i want a ~dumb phone but im stuck with this iphone i already have. i could sell the iphone but i do need the apps i wouldnt have on a dumb phone so i try to do what i can to dumb it down
I guess a lot of people only need a dumbphone most of the time but a smartphone becomes a lifesaver a small fraction of the time. Like to hire a cab once in a while, get information online or buy museum tickets on a decent browser while travelling, have access to public transport app in an unknown city, navigation in a vehicle, etc.
So there is a case of having the capabilities of the smartphone but not wanting the distraction that are part of the ecosystem. In my own experience, I don't have any social media accounts anymore except one one the fediverse but I only access it from the browser and don't get distracted by notifications.
I just wish there was an easy way to mute everyone but a selected number of contacts (you can sorta do it but you need to go through all your contacts, it doesn't work for unknown numbers or for calls). The only real people I want a phone/message tone is my partner, my daughters and their school numbers[1]. I want everyone else to be silent and when calling being redirected to voicebox immediately.
[1] which doesn't work as usually people from school use their private smartphones.
What appeals to me is the choice about when I want to enable the smart features. Instead of finding myself victim to alerts and being late to the notification, I want to choose when I spend time on my phone. There are a few ways to achieve this, but I decided to give Dumbify a shot.
It is a pity that it is not as well thought out as it appears. For example, the suggestion to remove system applications will almost immediately lead to a bootloop.
I, for example, have a hard time imagining how to protect elderly parents from a text message that will send them a link that, when clicked, will bombard them with suggestions to enable notifications, and then notifications will bombard them with suggestions to do something else.
Hey I'm the author. I definitely didn't mean to imply you should remove critical system apps (I don't think that's possible on vanilla iOS).
More just that it's worth deleting most apps beyond the basics like calls,text,calendar,maps etc
hey nah I don't (it's a very new blog!).
In the future though I'm considering purchasing and writing reviews of specific "dumb phones" like the Nokia 6300 4g. There's an affiliate marketing angle there, and I'm also considering creating Youtube review videos too.
I recognise the problems this 'dumbphone' trend is trying to solve but I really don't understand many of the solutions people are putting forth.
What I did years ago is aggressively manage my notifications settings, deleted the apps that were a problem (twitter, reddit) and I'm assertive about not being in too many group chats + notifications off for those. And it's been working great.
Notifications off by default and apps not on the Home Screen by default already goes a very long way. For me, there is no need to make my phone any dumber.
I would add that if you truly want to distract yourself, ‘no notifications’ policy doesn’t work. You may just open your distraction and update it manually, expecting for the notification to arrive. Even when you set it to never bother you. So, the best way is to explore what triggers you to distract in the first place.
I don’t mean turning off the notifications isn’t going to work. It would, and I highly recommend turning off everything, but the urgent stuff. You’ll notice you won’t miss what you truly need anyway. And you still may distract yourself, when you want it.
I think it's worth viewing through an addiction lens. Some people have addictive personalities, and their brains work differently when presented with things like this. I can have just one drink, or play just a bit of a video game. But I know people who will tip into a destructive addiction spiral from a tiny impetus like that, such that completely avoiding what to me would be a harmless thing is the only way they can live a normal life.
It's sort of like people with clinical depression. Advice from people who're not clinically depressed is often terrible, because it's stuff that'll work great if you're a neurotypical person. And it's legitimately hard to get in the mindset of someone whose brain works differently than yours for things like this, and understand what's incredibly difficult for them despite being trivial for you.
For Android users, take a look at BaldPhone. Fully Open Source and primarily aimed at seniors, does a pretty good job at simplifying the interface making most important actions easier to perform.
It does not turn a smartphone into a dumbphone (I don't think that is even possible without removing entire parts of the system, possibly bricking the device) but the simpler and immediate interface makes it a lot more usable.
This article is all about showing off and getting attention from people asking about your home screen. It’s all about consuming minimalism and telling people. I disable all notifications but phone, messages and calendar, install minimal applications, no sns, and only show the basics on Home Screen. No need to configure the whole minimal wallpaper, just get your phone far for eyesight.
I’m a bit confused by “Bitwarden is built in now” - are you saying that you no longer need the Bitwarden app to connect iOS’s password autofill to my bitwarden vault?
I tried the "grayscale-only display" for kicks, and it sucks, primarily with Apps that are better off with different colors - Maps.
Besides that, I have been disabling Notifications for ages, and that is the one decision that I believe was one of the best decisions of my phone life. I wrote an article in 2014[1] that needs a serious update, but it still makes sense.
Make it a habit to turn off Notifications as soon as you install a new app unless they are critical, such as Medical or Kid/school-related.
My Home page has a minimal wallpaper that I did a few years back, and it stayed. I usually leave one row at the bottom for beta-testing and region-specific Apps I use while traveling.
Of course, none of the Social Media Apps are on my phone. I checked my screen time to include this comment, and I've 37 minutes Daily Average. So, on most usage, I should still likely be averaging less than an hour daily.
You can make the greyscale toggle on triple power/home button, or via control centre. Thus, you can have it on most of the time, toggle it to look at a map, then toggle it back.
You can also have a Shortcut that toggles the setting when you open and close specific apps.
I just did it and it’s very simple:
- in the Shortcuts app, go to Automations
- add a new one and pick “App” as the trigger
- choose the apps you want color in and pick “run immediately” and on open and close
- on the next screen pick “new blank automation”
- in the new shortcut add “Set Color Filters” and set to toggle
You can also make different automations for open and close, but toggle works as long as you toggle the effects manually. But in this case you can just toggle it back manually.
You could set up an "on app launch" automation shortcut for Maps to alter the Color Filter setting, but I'm not sure how you'd automate switching it back after closing/leaving Maps. I don't use the automations, but instead have a shortcuts widget with "toggle greyscreen" (among others) which is sufficient for me most of the time.
You can have 2 automation, one which enable grayscale when certain apps are open and one that disable it when the apps are closed. It’s under shortcuts > automation > app > is closed.
I put this in a different comment but you can also have a single automation that toggles the setting for those apps on open and close. This way you have a single list of apps to maintain.
Probably a bug but my browser in dark mode actually inverts image and video into something like posterized predator vision. Since I was looking for grayscale anyway, I’ve kept it and not looked back.
Even though phone manufacturers and service providers are doing everything they can to limit the availability of smaller, reasonably sized phones.. even the huge phone I get forced into using is just incredibly frustrating to browse the web with. Besides the usual gdpr harassment taking up a third of every screen, mobile just increases the thirsty demands for me to install apps, etc.
Might as well drive home the point that friction is inevitable rather than making it easier to start an interaction that’s only going to annoy me. If I need to do anything other than view simple text, I already know I’ll have to get out the laptop
Try turning down the color saturation. For me ~ 25% of original saturation is sufficient for using UIs that use color information.
I had the same annoyance as you, switching back and forth wasn't pleasant, and I'd forget. I think part of the reason is that switching between 0% <-> 100% saturation doesn't give room to adapt. It feels like a bandwidth of information is missing. But, if the colorspace is barely noticeable, your brain will fill in the colors for you with the information it gets... and the high-saturation default color-set would start to appear abrading and unnatural.
Actually, my primary usage of my phone is photography. I'm assuming the saturation will have an impact on Photography as I won't be seeing the ideal colors.
disclaimer: No relation. Adding to this clearspace app. Kicks you out of your current at after a selected amount of time. Takes time to load the app in, really good jolt to the brain. Although the apps SSO is buggy af, and it glitches out sometimes.
If the problem is social media app addiction, I have found the best solution is to turn on screen time, whitelist your most important apps like messages, calendar etc. and then enable a passcode to access any other app. Ask a friend to set a pin code for you so you cannot cheat.
Another solution is to just use an apple watch with cellular as your primary phone. It has everything you need (spotify, imessage, etc.) but nothing that distracts you like youtube, tiktok etc.
It's important to note that music streaming and texting are also wants rather than needs. I've recently started leaving my house where the only electronic device that I go with is my compact camera.
Sony ZV-1. I've also got a smallrig L bracket on it for extra tripod mount points (I use it as a webcam with a wall power supply, but the built in mount is blocked by the battery compartment door when it's open) and it is still pocketable. I would say the image quality is better than my phone (Samsung S10) and worse than my DSLR (Nikon d3400). Sometimes I prefer it over my DSLR though, like for its super fast and accurate auto focus.
Apple watch is a 'dumb' phone. I upgraded to watch ultra for this purpose. Just leave the iphone at home or in the car (bonus: one less item to carry). I use browser to check twitter occasionally, but it helps break the habit of keeping phone around all the time. Do miss the camera though..
I take a medium approach and turn off almost all notifications, do not install “social” addictionware apps or similar junk, turn off background refresh for almost everything, and if I need some gratuitous app on a trip I uninstall it as soon as I don’t.
I haven’t tried their lock down mode yet whatever it’s called.
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[ 4.1 ms ] story [ 228 ms ] threadMay as well rename the article to 'how I changed the appearance of my iPhone'.
I also found out the hard way a decade ago that having access to productivity apps such as outlook usually meant to enroll your smartphone as a device managed by your IT and it was a big no to me.
If you don't go after the underlying reason you want to distract yourself from real life by entering the portal in your pocket, all the tips and tricks in the world won't fix the problem.
Although it could be argued that the question does not make a lot of sense. A browser is a tool. Is a kitchen knife a murder weapon? Not per se, but it can be.
Also interestingly enough text-based social media (HN, Reddit, Bluesky, X) addict me way more than video based ones (like Tiktok, Youtube, or Instagram) do. I don't know if it's because it takes longer to digest the information through video than text but I do know that I have no problem with looking at pictures and videos and stopping for days/weeks, but once I get hooked on text it's really hard to stop. I even spent a year in middle school addicted to reading books though I had other things going on in my life at the time and books were a bit of an escape. I've had waves of HN addiction and definitely enjoy X and Bluesky because of the textual media of the experience.
As an adult I mostly grew out of these addictions but I can still feel their pull on me. Luckily I have enough going on in my offline life that digital life takes a backseat.
If you want to think of these in terms of "algorithms", then IRC and Usenet have a simple "chronological" algorithm to display posts while Reddit and HN use an "upvote" based engagement algorithm. X and more "modern" social networks may use more sophisticated algorithms but they're all just algorithms to return a sorted order of items.
Social media was coined in the mid 2000s to separate new platforms built on social graphs and old platforms like forums. You do not follow individuals on Hacker News.
The described solution is just someone procrastinating by spending even more time on their phone trying to customize things and fiddle with apps.
Same category as building a todo app to become more productive or building a blogging engine to write more instead of just writing.
Abjectly false.
For a similar need, I turned to a small, portable device, that runs on battery (but not a laptop) to run 24/7.
I got a couple of ipads, but since I can't install some OS that I want (without jumping a million hoops).
So I got myself a HP Elite X2, second-hand, and it is GREAT. Then I wanted a second one, I couldn't find another HP Elite X2 (at the same price) so I got a Dell Latitude 2-in-1 (basically a Win tablet).
Basically I want something to run 24/5, so even if there is a power disruption (maintenance on building, etc.) my downtime would be the 2-3 minutes until my router/wifi reconnects. (we get some once every couple of weeks and a desktop wouldn't reboot)(and I didn't want a laptop as I don't want any fans/movable/mechanical components).
I've build custom base to keep them upright --> =|=|= so they can 'breathe' well, and stay cool.
I also got a KVM so I got all my devices hooked on it, so when I do need to do some work on them I can do it with my big screen/keyboard/mouse. I only remember to dust them every couple of weeks, and they are golden!
Of course lobbying politicians is an absurd path to running an iPad as a server, but the other options I know of are becoming a politician and campaigning against large corporations, or advocating for change and getting enough people to care that politicians bend to the will of the people rather than the corporations. Out of the three options, writing a check to buy legal change seems to be the easiest way.
Do you know of any other ways I haven't mentioned to use an iPad as a server? Or are you sticking to the "you're holding it wrong" approach?
Yes, I will stick to that approach. Let's move things forward, life is short. My motorcycle has a front wheel and is therefore technically a wheelbarrow. If Yamaha is not interested in helping me transform it into a functional wheelbarrow, should I lobby congress or maybe hold the president hostage, or should I go out and buy one of the many quality wheelbarrows on sale – even if none of them are from the brand Yamaha that I personally prefer?
Do you have a major financial interest in people not being able to use their computers for computing? I don't understand why you are so against this.
I take your core point but your specific example I think is handled by that.
Using Uber as the example if I turn off Lock Screen notifications and turn on time sensitive notifications then will I get no marketing notifications, and only notifications about my driver turning up?
It's up to the app developer, they get to mark notifications as time sensitive or not. So if someone decides that because a coupon is expiring soon it's "time sensitive" to ping you about it, then they can mark it as such. Hypothetically Apple could frown on this in app review, but it isn't something app reviewers are likely to be able to reliably catch.
Uber eats though, I can never seem to get right, and it tries to spam a lot more. So I still agree with the original point
That’s still miles away from being able to filter or categorize notifications by regexps or keywords at least.
-----
Well, you can do it with apps like FilterBox
Like a few pokemon go add-ons that can read what's on your screen and be a overlay (to distinguish good pokemon from bad)
https://developer.android.com/guide/topics/permissions/overv...
https://developer.android.com/reference/android/Manifest.per...
Of course if this was exposed then people would start blocking the Google data vaccum - and that's bad for business
one more: account > settings > privacy > offers and promos > allow personalised set to Off
yes, apple needs to fix this.
If I’m an app developer I could just lie and say all my marketing trash notifications are actually time sensitive/important so that you’ll still receive them. Apple has a similar thing and it’s only a soft policy (that an app reviewer would have to catch) that prevents developers from abusing it.
If it really is up to the app developer to categorize their notifications so that you can disable categories, then it sounds like it’s just a simplified way of managing individual apps’ notification preferences, no? (Not that that’s a bad thing, I wish iOS had this.)
Yes, but any popular app will have implemented it.
> If I’m an app developer I could just lie and say all my marketing trash notifications are actually time sensitive/important so that you’ll still receive them
In those cases, your users would come to distrust your app. I reckon, only a negligible percentage of 3b Android users ever turn any notification off. More likely that some have learnt to ignore them altogether (banner blindness); swipe left to dismiss those isn't exactly as hostile as cookie banners are. Or, worse uninstall your "misbehaving" app (some are annoyed by notifications).
There was 1 app in their question.
notifications from a single app are split by category, and you can disable in the phone settings notifications from a single category will keeping the rest for a single app. (though this categorizing is done by the app dev not you, so the dev can mix annoying stuff with the useful)
The reason I buy an iPhone is that I want all the non dumb things. If I wanted all the dumb stuff I'd just not bother.
So there is a case of having the capabilities of the smartphone but not wanting the distraction that are part of the ecosystem. In my own experience, I don't have any social media accounts anymore except one one the fediverse but I only access it from the browser and don't get distracted by notifications.
I just wish there was an easy way to mute everyone but a selected number of contacts (you can sorta do it but you need to go through all your contacts, it doesn't work for unknown numbers or for calls). The only real people I want a phone/message tone is my partner, my daughters and their school numbers[1]. I want everyone else to be silent and when calling being redirected to voicebox immediately.
[1] which doesn't work as usually people from school use their private smartphones.
It is a pity that it is not as well thought out as it appears. For example, the suggestion to remove system applications will almost immediately lead to a bootloop.
I, for example, have a hard time imagining how to protect elderly parents from a text message that will send them a link that, when clicked, will bombard them with suggestions to enable notifications, and then notifications will bombard them with suggestions to do something else.
- Never log into an iCloud account
- [optional] don't connect to the internet except for low bandwidth mobile data
Done.
I don’t mean turning off the notifications isn’t going to work. It would, and I highly recommend turning off everything, but the urgent stuff. You’ll notice you won’t miss what you truly need anyway. And you still may distract yourself, when you want it.
It's sort of like people with clinical depression. Advice from people who're not clinically depressed is often terrible, because it's stuff that'll work great if you're a neurotypical person. And it's legitimately hard to get in the mindset of someone whose brain works differently than yours for things like this, and understand what's incredibly difficult for them despite being trivial for you.
https://github.com/UriahShaulMandel/BaldPhone
Photos and Maps, while deleting the unneeded Google apps, keep the dumb phone from informing third party adtech of your day.
The minimal launcher is cool; this is built in: https://support.apple.com/en-nz/guide/assistive-access-iphon...
And you can also add an accessibility switch with Back Tab to turn this on and off by tapping three times at the back of your iphone.
Besides that, I have been disabling Notifications for ages, and that is the one decision that I believe was one of the best decisions of my phone life. I wrote an article in 2014[1] that needs a serious update, but it still makes sense.
Make it a habit to turn off Notifications as soon as you install a new app unless they are critical, such as Medical or Kid/school-related.
My Home page has a minimal wallpaper that I did a few years back, and it stayed. I usually leave one row at the bottom for beta-testing and region-specific Apps I use while traveling.
Of course, none of the Social Media Apps are on my phone. I checked my screen time to include this comment, and I've 37 minutes Daily Average. So, on most usage, I should still likely be averaging less than an hour daily.
1. https://brajeshwar.com/2014/missing-step-productivity-activi...
I just did it and it’s very simple:
- in the Shortcuts app, go to Automations
- add a new one and pick “App” as the trigger
- choose the apps you want color in and pick “run immediately” and on open and close
- on the next screen pick “new blank automation”
- in the new shortcut add “Set Color Filters” and set to toggle
You can also make different automations for open and close, but toggle works as long as you toggle the effects manually. But in this case you can just toggle it back manually.
Even though phone manufacturers and service providers are doing everything they can to limit the availability of smaller, reasonably sized phones.. even the huge phone I get forced into using is just incredibly frustrating to browse the web with. Besides the usual gdpr harassment taking up a third of every screen, mobile just increases the thirsty demands for me to install apps, etc.
Might as well drive home the point that friction is inevitable rather than making it easier to start an interaction that’s only going to annoy me. If I need to do anything other than view simple text, I already know I’ll have to get out the laptop
I had the same annoyance as you, switching back and forth wasn't pleasant, and I'd forget. I think part of the reason is that switching between 0% <-> 100% saturation doesn't give room to adapt. It feels like a bandwidth of information is missing. But, if the colorspace is barely noticeable, your brain will fill in the colors for you with the information it gets... and the high-saturation default color-set would start to appear abrading and unnatural.
https://support.apple.com/guide/assistive-access-iphone/welc...
It has some major limitations though, like you can’t zoom into photos, and you can’t use Bluetooth headphones or AirPlay.
Another solution is to just use an apple watch with cellular as your primary phone. It has everything you need (spotify, imessage, etc.) but nothing that distracts you like youtube, tiktok etc.
I haven’t tried their lock down mode yet whatever it’s called.