Long hours of coding lead to eye strain. Optometrists recommend the twenty-twenty-twenty rule, which is to look 20 feet in the distance for 20 seconds every 20 minutes. Easier said than done. So to help out, this simple python script, combined with a cron job, kicks off a MacOS notification reminder every 20 minutes.
These instructions are only for Mac OS and the script utilizes Python3. Here are excellent guides to installing Homebrew and Python3 as well as Pip and Virtualenv
brew install terminal-notifier
Make a note of where brew installs terminal-notifier. This is important because this value is hardcoded in the python script. Not ideal, but cron jobs don't necessarily run from the same directory where the script is located, so using
relative paths does not work. Also, Cron doesn't like aliases in bashrc because the default shell option for
non-interactive shells is to not expand aliases. So update the terminal_notifier_path in the script for your environment.
pip install emoji
Only necessary, if you want to have some fun with emojis in your python script
If you don't have crontab already set up on your Mac, in Terminal run 'crontab -e`
This will open up vim with a new cronfile. In the file, add the below crontab making sure to replace the path to the
O_o.py script for your environment
*/20 07-17 * * MON-FRI /path/to/O_o.py
This cron job will run every 20 minutes from 7h00 to 17h00 on weekdays. When you save this update in vim, you should see
crontab: installing new crontab and you are all set
You can view all your crontabs with crontab -l
To enable notifications on Mac go to System Preferences > Notifications > terminal-notifier. Update
terminal-notifier alert style to Alerts