Introducing Byōyomi 1.0

It’s a sunny day here in Tokyo. Blue skies and Cherry blossoms everywhere. A perfect day for the introduction of Sugoi Software’s second program that also has a weird Japanese name, Byōyomi.

I guess the next thing I’m supposed to do is tell everybody what it does, which doesn’t sound like much fun as you can see that on the Byōyomi product page. Instead I’m going to tell you what problems it solves and how it solves them.

How I use Byōyomi

I like to be on time to things. I hate being late. Often I used to find myself with about 10 or 15 minutes to kill before I had to leave the house, run an errand etc. I would naturally surf the web, read the news and blogs I hadn’t had time to read until then.

Often I would get so caught up in reading that I would lose track of time, glance at the clock and bam. I’m now 5 minutes late. No more.

How others use Byōyomi

Because of Byōyomi’s nature each person can use it in a different way that suits their own needs. One of the testers uses Byōyomi as a standard timer. He uses it to tell him to stop a particular activity when the alert goes off. So it’s time to stop surfing the internet and get back to work. Simple enough and Byōyomi shines doing that.

However, another tester uses Byōyomi in a way that I had not intended it being used. He uses it not to stop something but to start something.
They often say that getting started on a project is the hardest thing to do. To break the momentum of doing nothing to working can seem impossible at times. He starts a 10 minute timer and works until the timer goes off at which point he is free to quit working. However it always works out that working for just 10 minutes breaks the momentum and he continues working.

Three uses and the most important not mentioned

Cup Noodles! Being the stereotypical poor college student that I am, I eat my fair share of Cup Noodles. The 3 minute wait is agonizing at times. Luckily though I can start a timer via the quick access menu and not watch the live countdown. I can get lost on the intertubes then all of a sudden I see this:

The lowdown

Byōyomi requires Mac OS X Leopard 10.5 or higher.
It is free to try and $12 US Dollars to buy.

Bonus: Jisho users who purchased Jisho on or before April 1st, 2008 are eligible get $5 off Byōyomi! If you have purchased Jisho and didn’t get the email containing the coupon, please send an email to support@sugoisoft.com and we will get it to you asap.