Silent Mode was a Mistake

My phone bings three times, and I really want to tell it 'listen, matey, if I haven't answered the first three bings, I won't answer the next'. I wander over and tell it to shut up.

Of course if I forget to turn off silent mode, I could miss something important in a few hours. The entire approach here misunderstands how people work. Nobody likes constant, nagging, bings.

This is where the do-it-yourself computers really shine. I've cobbled together a short script for all notifications to run through. It works like this:

• If there's been no bing-sound in the last 10 minutes, it bings.
• Messages display at the bottom of the screen, like the ticker-tape in a news broadcast.

These rules have made my computer workflow much more pleasant.

Unfortunately, you can't tell phones to do anything, so it sits mostly silently, so I don't have to hear it whine.