Timer Cycle & Notifications

Timer cycle

The timer follows this pattern (with default durations):

1. Work session: 25 minutes (started with Enter)
2. Short break: 5 minutes
3. (repeat 3 more times)
4. Long break: 15 minutes
5. (cycle repeats)

Example: Work → Break → Work → Break → Work → Break → Work → Long Break → (repeat)

Break transitions

When a work session completes:

• With auto_start_break = true: break timer starts immediately and continues counting down
• With auto_start_break = false: timer pauses, allowing you to set up before pressing Space to resume

You can also start a break manually at any time with B (when the timer is stopped). This:

• Immediately starts a break (short or long, depending on cycle position)
• Increments the work session counter toward the next long break
• Is useful for taking breaks without doing a work session first

All durations and cycle length are configurable in settings.

Notifications

Audio

• Requires the audio feature flag at build time (--features audio)
• Plays an audio file when sessions transition
• Configure separate files for work→break and break→work transitions
• Supports WAV, MP3, OGG Vorbis, and FLAC
• Omit the setting (or leave it empty) to disable sound for that transition
• Without the audio feature, the terminal bell is emitted on every transition instead

Desktop notifications

• Shows a system notification when a session ends/starts
• Requires a notification daemon (Linux) or native notification support (macOS/Windows)
• Disabled by default (opt-in with notify_desktop = true)
• Fails gracefully if the notification daemon is unavailable

Status messages

• Displayed in the Status bar when state changes
• Auto-clear after a configurable timeout (default 5 seconds)
• Set message_timeout_secs = 0 to keep messages visible