alt Hacker NewsShow HN: I made a app that uses NFC as a physical switch to block distractions
Hi HN!
Super proud to showcase Foqos! I wanted to create a way to physically block apps on my phone, always had a bunch of NFC tags, combined the 2 together over the holiday break and Foqos was born. You can create profiles, write them to NFC tags and track your weekly focus.
Its completely open source and will always be free! There is an affiliate link in the app for nfc tags and donations are completely optional
Comments
By the way, you can trigger iOS shortcuts with NFC tags, so in principle you can trigger any functionality exposed as a Shortcut action. However, NFC recognition doesn’t always work as smoothly as one would hope.
I'm curious why the NFC tags are required at all?
Can't you switch profiles on your phone without scanning an NFC tag already? Couldn't your app allow profile switching without requiring any NFC tags?
It's not clear to me what the NFC tags add to this experience.
This is awesome, yay for an open source https://getbrick.app/
I'm curious if you have an NFC tag that you'd recommend or that you like to use?
Very cool; wondering if this could work as a parental control. "screen time" on iOS is fundamentally broken, and something like this would require the child to come to the parent for screen time extensions (if the parent has the NFC chip).
I was intrigued by brick, now this, and can't use either. is there seriously no android app like these? :(
I have occasionally wanted to trigger location-specific behavior on my kid's devices, like turning the wifi off when in their bedroom. This feels broadly in the category to me.
Very cool! I was about to pay $50 to do this with Brick. What's the best way to support the project?
Love this but it doesn't seem to work as I had hoped. I have 140 apps blocked in the profile but it appears only 15 actually blocked on my phone. Is there an app limit to how many can be blocked?
It would've been nice to see what the apps looks like when they're blocked.
Neat implementation! Big fan of integrating more NFC into apps. There's something satisfying and reassuring about the physicality of it all.
I'll add a vote to whoever has the time to port it over to android =)
I'm finding that scanning NFC tags is pretty slow with iPhone. There's this automatic flow that's pretty cumbersome and slows me down. Then when it fails there's some annoying animation. This is with the Yubikey authenticator app.
Are you finding anything similar? Is it not annoying to be scanning these all the time?
Cool idea, wanted to try it out but it's not available in my country. Any reason for this? :)
So this is just a wrapper for Automations and Profiles (or how Apple calls it: Focus).
But i like the idea to make such features accessible to the everyone and not only people who geek out on their phone.
As others pointed out you should implement qr codes which would make it even more usable.
Neat! Any idea if it'd be possible to make this work with macOS as well? I don't think Macs have NFC, but they do sync things like Do Not Disturb states between iOS and macOS.
Looking forward to use it. But its currently not available in my country.
Previous comments show, DEV is already working on it. :)
It would be nice to see a demo of the app working in the real world with an nfc tag, not just an app recording.
Cool idea! Any chance you’ll make it available in New Zealand? I’d love to try this out.
I might be missing it on your page but can't seem to find the link to your source repo.
Impressive. I'm sure it will help tons of people dealing with lack of focus.
This is really cool! I know developing apple apps is expensive, how can I donate?
This is awesome, now I can switch between work and home with just a tap.
Add more regions for the app, maybe european countries too?
This is a fantastic way to lock down an app for kids.
would it be possible to trigger profiles with Bluetooth Beacons?
I use the brick app: https://getbrick.app/, and it works pretty well, but they have this weird bug where selecting certain apps on a block list crashes the app. They have a pop-up indicating that it's some apple-related bug, which I find kind of hard to believe. Is this something that also happens in your app?
I noticed the trend of "Made with (Love emoji)", but has anyone tried Made with Hate or other emotions?
Not available in Spain. :(
I really love the app and the idea - I am using it on an iPhone 13 Pro. It does work to block everything but there seem to be issues when selecting or deselcting from large categories. E.G. I have 30 Health Apps and I want to enable SleepCycle while keeping the others blocked. That does not work it will always automatically unblock all 30. Therefore it does not let me create any profiles with actual use unless I block everything.