Context Sensing for Mac OS X
Pennyworth Punch Clock: Getting Started
When you first launch Pennyworth Punch Clock (PPC), a window like the one below will appear:
This is the main time logging window. The topmost table contains a list of time streams. In PPC, a time stream is a timeline that tracks time slices that describe how you spend your time. A time stream may contain slices that represent the active application you are running, the front most site in a web browser, your location, etc.
If you are running PPC without Pennyworth, the initial list of time streams will be empty. (Otherwise, PPC will query Pennyworth for you context and add streams for your current activity, location, and social context.) To begin adding time streams, click the "Preferences" tab:
To enable tracking your current active applications or web sites, enable the "Log active web hosts" or "Log active applications". This will enable sensors that create automatic time streams that are updated whenever you visit a new website or switch applications.
To create a manual time stream, click the "+" button below the table. This will create a new time stream that you should rename. Unlike automatic time streams that update without your intervention, manual time streams depend upon you to make updates in the time stream. In the example above, I created a "Projects" time stream to track what projects I am engaged with. When I switch projects, I will need to update the stream myself to let PPC know about the change. (This is covered below.)
After setting up automatic and manual time streams, return to the "Time Log" section. The previously-empty tables are now populated by the newly created streams and slices.
The "Projects" stream is selected by default and new updates may be made by filling in the combo box and clicking update. This action updates the manual time stream. Other streams may be selected from the pulldown, and this panel may be invoked at any time by using the Command-Option-P key combination.
After some time of using PPC, the time streams will grow to collect a detailed log of your time use. To only see a range of time (as opposed to the whole timeline), select a duration from the pulldown in the upper-right side of the "Time Log" interface:
You can select a variety of preset durations or choose your own by selecting "Custom". When you select "Custom", PPC will prompt you for the desired duration:
You may enter the desired date and time by using the format illustrated above or you may use natural language to describe the desired times. PPC will interpret the natural language and set the start and end times.
The time log is a useful tool for scanning your time streams, but it is unable to tell you how you spend your time. Clicking the "Reports" tab will bring up several options for more useful reviews and analysis:
The "Basic Report" generates a cumulative listing of how much time you spend between slices in each time stream. This report is useful for answering questions such as "How much time do I spend in the Mail application?" The "Detailed Report" allows you to cross-reference how you spend your time with respect to the other time slices:
In this report, you can select a time stream and a slice value to see how other streams and slices correlate with the selected values. In the example above, observe that when Microsoft Word was my active application, I spent 12 seconds on the Daring Fireball website. This report allows you to cross-reference time use with any combination of time streams. This is useful for answering questions such as "What applications do I run at home?" and "What websites do I tend to use when I'm working on project 'Foo'?".
PPC is designed to run all the time and in the background. After reviewing some reports, you may close the PPC window and resume your regular computer usage. If you need to invoke the application again (to update a time stream or to review time use, etc.), you can directly access any of the features above by clicking the PPC icon located in your status bar:
Selecting an item from the list will bring up the desired feature.
Questions, comments, or suggestions?
If you have any questions, comments, or suggestion, please send them via e-mail to
If you would like to discuss Pennyworth Punch Clock with other users, I created a Google Group for this purpose. You can join this group by visiting this link. On the Google Groups page, you may subscribe to the discussion via e-mail.