Show HN: Stretch My Time Off – An Algorithm to Optimize Your Vacation Days (stretchmytimeoff.com)
Hey HN! I built StretchMyTimeOff as a quick experiment using Cursor (Anysphere's AI code editor) and GPT-4o to see how far AI could go in building a simple, functional site.
What it does: The site helps you get the most out of your vacation by suggesting optimal days to take off around national holidays, maximizing long breaks with minimal vacation days, anywhere in the world and for any calendar year.
It's an idea I've had for a while, and building the algorithm with GPT was a fun challenge. Any feedback or ideas I'm all ears :)
176 comments
[ 3.0 ms ] story [ 237 ms ] threadWould recommend being able to adjust the public holidays - for example: Juneteenth and Veterans day off were not days off of school+work.
Other future improvements would be some kind of tie in for airfare - these are typically some of the most expensive times to fly.
Love the idea
If you make a table of holidays and then check on/off those applicable, then have the algorithm fill back in as needed, that would be helpful.
My annual leave resets on April 1st, so being able to change the year would be handy.
I worked compressed hours (I have every Friday off)
I can carry over 5 unused days to the next year, and buy 5 more days. This might impact what days I take off.
Some regional feedback coming from Sweden - your source data set is not 100% in line with what most workers in Sweden will get. For example, 24 December, 31 December and Midsummer's Eve are not reflected as days off in this calendar.
Making it super customisable would be tough, as then it becomes just a personal calendar. Maybe showing the rankings transparently (3 options tied, choose which one wins) could be nice.
Like maybe make the days clickable and give us a popover button for : it'd like this day to be free - and just tread this day as a holiday from there (while deducting the day from the quota)
for example, my company has mandatory shutdown days, I have x additional days leave, and z study days leave that I expected to not use more than 1 study day in the same week and I need to use some of my leave by 30 jun as australia businesses manage the financial year as july to june, not jan to december.
I get (8) holidays each year: New Year’s Day, Memorial Day, July 4th, Labor Day, Thanksgiving, Black Friday, Christmas Eve, and Christmas Day.
Two of my company holidays aren’t federal holidays, so being able to toggle arbitrary weekdays as holidays would also be useful.
Also, sometimes holidays fall on the weekend and the observed holiday date is arbitrarily chosen.
Your algorithm did pick the same vacation days as I did this year for December, so it does seem to be working properly in that sense :)
I am in the US, and it says I have 11 days off. If I say I get 0 days off, it says: "Let's stretch your time off from 0 days to 18 days". It looks like it's counting the weekends prior to a holiday no matter what as a "bonus" day, which is a strange methodology to me. (I would expect that it would only count days that it performed some action to optimize, otherwise it's just table stakes)
Adding to the comment on "calculations". Perhaps the wording could be improved, now it feels a bit like a dark pattern in sales.
This is not the best version, but explains what I mean:
"Let's turn your X days of time off into Y days of holidays."
If you think it would be fun, maybe you could expose different algorithm choices for how to allocate the blocks?
Eg, I don't necessarily need to maximize the block lengths, but would like the holidays to be more evenly spread through the year. At the moment, it gives me a huge block around the easter period and another one week block later in the same month. And then, there are no holidays for an entire six months from the end of May to the start of November, despite several public holidays in between! I suggest an alternative algorithm would seek fewer one-week blocks and more long-weekend blocks, with some sort of pressure which penalizes blocks for being too close together?
It'd be nice to have different options to maximise my annual leave. For example, if I have 10 days off + 13 public holidays, the website shows all combinations to maximise the number of days off work.
Anyway, OP has a point. I hate traveling on the same day everyone else plans to due to some holiday gap / bridge / whatever.
also on the plus side, lot of colleges takes leave in December. so, workloads on that time are also less. it's like a mini vacation if one WFH during that period.
In NSW Australia, it shows 11 days between Dec 21 and Dec 31, but Jan 1 is a public holiday here and you capsule add Jan2&3 plus the following weekend to get 16 days 21 Dec 2024 through 5 Jan 2025.
Nowadays, I find that the best time to take PTO is when I feel like taking PTO. Taking a long weekend when I’m feeling burnt out or disengaged goes much further for me than grinding for the entire first half of th year to get a week off for 4th of July. YMMV.
As such, taking off Fridays tends to get me less ROI while Mondays tends to be nice because while everyone deals with problems from the last week head on, I can roll in on a Tuesday with the benefit of their insights and progress. Then there’s the fact even if I’m off on Friday people I socialize with are likely still working anyways so… it could be any day for myself.
I don't know, seems much easier that if you dont want to work then don't!
I mean the tool OP posted recommended 2 weeks off at the end of March into April on the easter holiday (because of the friday and monday holiday)... who is honestly doing that?
This topic has always rubbed me the wrong way I think because its way too closely tied to the whole workaday / "work sucks" / ratrace / 9-5 mentality.
One other thing as I continue my rant, related, the whole "plan your holidays for the next year so we can figure out the resource planning, even if you move your holiday!" Ugh so depressing, I always am like "welp next year is planned already and its only November". Nothing spontaneous, nothing interesting.
Anyway, I realize also I am likely in the minority here, HN folks will do anything for a "hack".
sad parents tied to school holidays noises.
The school is allowed to make an exemption for a maximum of 10 days, above that you need to contact the school attendance officer. This can only be provided if the reason falls under some specific types.
If you want to take your children on a holiday outside the national holidays, you have to provide proof that this only a possibility during term time.
You can read more about this at https://www.government.nl/topics/compulsory-school-attendanc...
So now you are not free to do whatever you wish or force schools to teach the way you would like to.
And this is great.
And I also pulled my kids from school once or twice to get a better price on skiing but I am ashamed of myself.
Law is not optional.
Sounds like a real day off, though. ;)
Like, can the tool be expanded to do:
1) Finding vacation time for a group of people (family? college friends?)
2) Can you include black-out days (school days for kids, whatever your specific job requires, etc)
I mean, as long as _I'm_ not responsible for making this thing I can make feature suggestions all day :)
It's like peak cross country season?! Still loads of snow, but nice weather. I skied in shorts and a tshirt for days this easter!
You know you don't have to do as the tool says? It just highlights one of many variables you can use when deciding when to take your time off. If you have other needs (as your weather thingy, or spontaneity, or when kids are off school), you are of course free to take that into account.
i am absolutely lost in why anyone would do that. And on other side, resource planning is only lame excuse.
But AFAIK most of western europe goes that way.. which is a preliminary planned existance. Boring like hell. Where is Life?
Planning ahead is the only way to actually have some freedom. You can rent really nice cottages, get that night train reservation, etc., as long as you plan ahead.
I'd love it if it were possible to have elective days off for kids in school as well, but that's usually only possible for people in certain jobs who can't use the regular school holidays.
If your trying to maximize "contiguous days off" and you truly don't care when it is, a tool like this is super helpful.
Looking at the calendar and seeing the next holiday is 6+ weeks away can really drag you down.
Covers most of the tricks people here (New Zealand) use to stretch out their Holiday lengths.
Dec 21 to Dec 31: 11 days is actually Dec 21 to Jan 1: 12 days and still only 5 vacation days.
By the way, I would suggest adding an option: how many consecutive days off does the company allow. And which days are absolutely not allowed to be taken.
10 years ago, in my company (based in Japan), taking a day off on the first day of the week (generally Monday unless there's an holiday) was not allowed due to the general meeting kicking off the week. This changed recently in my company but as this meeting is common in many Japanese companies, some companies might still apply this restriction.
Likewise, taking a day off before or after a holiday was not allowed except for some specific days (typically Golden Week end of April/beginning of May, Obon in August, and the end of year/New Year). This changed a few years ago.