[tptacek]

A plug here for F.lux, which attempts to correct for the unnatural color balance of computer screens and seems to have more or less eliminated my insomnia problems; the only times I have trouble sleeping anymore are traceable either to caffeine after noon, or forgetting that I've disabled F.lux.

[ics]

I recommend F.lux as well, but I've noticed a very unfortunate effect over the last few months... because of how soft it is on the eyes at night, I've learned that with it enabled I can continuously work 16-26 hour sessions without even realizing that I missed a sleep cycle. Obviously, this isn't a problem with F.lux itself, and I've tried very hard to tweak my settings so that this doesn't happen (it is auto-on/off, have experimented with different temp. levels too). In fact, I've gotten so used to it that when I know I need to go to bed soon I disable it entirely– once the blue light starts irritating me, I switch to a lamp and paper until I'm ready to get some shut-eye.

Notes: I don't drink coffee, green tea once in a while, and minimal late-night stimuli (lights mostly off, no music, ...).

[brittohalloran]

Really? You worked for 26 hours and didn't realize it because your screen was the right color?

[ics]

Read it again– I'm not saying F.lux is the source of my sleep issues, just that it's made the exacerbation of said issues occur less noticeably (to me, of course).

Before I started using F.lux there was an obvious taxing period around 1-2am where my eyes might have started to get blurry or headache would set in, assuming I had woken up and started working by ~8am. From there I would either go to bed or brute force the next few hours, despite being aware of the time in general. Now, I don't get that feeling until much later– either at 22hrs when the sun has come up and F.lux begins fading out, or a little later if I'm not paying attention until after the sun has come up and the screen's been blue for a while. (At that point, I either notice the sun through the trees or get a splitting headache).

To further describe where I work: shaded area, floor to ceiling books, no clock, no phones. I do graphic work during the day and by early evening I'm in the command line until whenever. I can usually get out during the day, but sometimes I just don't. I think the proper advice here would be to stop working at home while living in the city, but that's enough OT– I was simply pointing out my experience using F.lux!

[ankitml]

this is funny, because of how soft it is on the eyes at night... blame it on your stamina, work being interesting or your superior motivation and lack of distracting beings around. Dont blame it on a software man.

[reeses]

Go to bed!

[ics]

By far the fastest way to make myself fall asleep is to enumerate all possible excuses for not going to sleep yet. Either way I "win"...

[SeanDav]

Surely F.lux is fairly pointless unless the only source of light in your room is your computer monitor?

I would imagine that any windows or external lighting is going to have a far greater effect than F.lux. I tried F.lux a while ago when it was recommended in a previous HN post but for me the only difference it seemed to have, was to make my computer monitor more difficult to read by making it too dim.

[SeanDav]

Just tried it again. Still can't live with it at night, makes me feel like I am going blind with the shift to red. Might try it 1 more time with a gradual shift and see if that works but right now, certainly not useable for me.

[Centigonal]

I couldn't stand F.lux the first time either. What I did was set it to where I could barely tell the difference. After a week or so I would find myself thinking "too bluish" staring at my screen at night, at which point I lowered the color temperature slightly.

Within two months, I had found a setting I felt comfortable at (right now it's at 3500K).

[hmottestad]

Actually. Staring at a screen until midnight, the screen is a major light source.

Also for me, my desk lamp automagically dims from 11 to 1pm, just to make me feel a little more sleepy.

[wglb]

Do you mean 11pm to 1 am?

[hmottestad]

yes :)

[tptacek]

F.lux has not been fairly pointless for me. I am sure of that.

[ajdecon]

It's had some helpful effects for me, even when I have other lights on. The computer is what I'm spending the whole time looking at, after all.

[gingerlime]

I love f.lux, but it doesn't seem to work so well with my dual-monitor setup on xubuntu... and I'm never really sure if it's working properly. I wish it had some kind of a 'temperature indicator' or something.

[Inufu]

If f.lux doesn't work properly, give redshift a try. Does the exact same thing and works perfectly for me.

[gingerlime]

thanks for the tip. redshift seems to crash immediately after I launch it... not sure what's going on. Maybe it's time to switch back from xubuntu to ubuntu or something...

[parennoob]

Try the one-shot option. 'redshift -O 4700' should set both your monitors to 4700K.

[sneak]

If Ubuntu doesn't work properly, give OSX a try. Does the exact same thing and works perfectly for me.

[aclevernickname]

That's funny, because I have the opposite anecdote; I have been regularly converting OS X user to Kubuntu Lucid/KXStudio (with backports) for the last year or so. Know all those guys that are avoiding Lion and Mountain Lion like the plague that they are? Yeah. that's my market.

Tons of people with 3yo MBP's with an install of Snow Leopard, looking longingly at how pretty and useable my little powerless Netbook with 2GB of RAM is with OpenOffice/Dolphin/Blender/Gwenview/Firefox running and 40+ tabs open. They can barely run Safari, iPhoto, Mail.app, and Skype at the same time without constant beachballing, so they sit in quiet humility while I actually get stuff done.

Once installed on their computers, an install that just works, I grab AppMenu (QML) from kde-look and replace the default one. At this point the MBP owner has a better OS experience than Snow Leopard could/does offer, and we haven't even done any tweaking yet. like f.lux or redshift (which you can grab from a ppa). I don't see the crashes you guys do on these apps, oddly enough. just works for me and my customers.

I love you Mac guys, really. You pay top-dollar for your hardware, and then Apple forgets about you in less than 4 years. I almost feel like I'm a rescue worker for abused and battered Apple customers.

[eropple]

> They can barely run Safari, iPhoto, Mail.app, and Skype at the same time without constant beachballing

I am skeptical of your anecdote. My 2010 MBP was perfectly happy running Xcode, IntelliJ, and pretty much any other applications I'd care to run, and that was before I put a SSD in it (which, naturally, helped a lot).

I think you're stretching the truth by a great deal.

[path411]

The only application performance a SSD provides is initial load time, and write times.

[sneak]

Top dollar for hardware that lasts 36 months (the length of applecare) means $100/month. For people who "get stuff done" this is nothing. I literally spend more on bottled water than I do my top-dollar computers.

[parennoob]

Snarky as this is, I'm sorry to say that it's probably correct. I've never had to have any configuration or other problems with f.lux on OSX, it just works there. On Ubuntu, it just doesn't work. :)

(Ubuntu user since 2004, OSX since about last year)

[bkanber]

You can always observe what happens if you hit the Disable option. If there's a noticable difference, it was working.

[6d0debc071]

Its defaults, at least on windows, are quite striking. You ought to be able to see your screen's colour balance change in the space of a few seconds when it reaches the relevant time of day.