My computer is the source of all the things. It is both my place of work and entertainment. I connect with my family and friends and conduct meetings. I have all the papers that I am writing for my degree as well as a science fiction I have been working on. I learn by participating in Coursera classes and I play video games (Civ V, anyone?).
Given that all productive and downtime activities take place on the same screen, I have to be careful about how I spend my time. I discussed before the importance of staying away from my browser (thank you, Mailbox). Today I want to talk about RescueTime.
RescueTime tracks all the things you do on your computer. From the specific websites you access on your browser, to the programs you use such as Word or Mendeley. You can access your dashboard to see how you use your computer time. You can also classify certain activities from very productive to very distracting.
My goal is to have my productivity pulse above 80. This is not always possible, since there are meetings to schedule, emails to respond to, and world news to keep up with. In general, as long I spend most of my time in the Composition and Learning categories, I call it a good day.