rtimer: Writing a Timer with Aider

This morning, I needed a timer to spend only 10 minutes reading a book. I searched for CLI tools but couldn't find anything immediately that suited my needs due to laziness. So, I decided to write one myself with the help of AI.

Using Aider coupled with Claude Sonnet 3.5, I was able to get something working on the first try. Afterward, I added a few features:

• Display an ASCII art clock
• Add libnotify support
• Show remaining and elapsed time
• Indicate when it was launched and when it will end

In total, it took about one hour. Occasionally, there were compilation errors, but inputting the error output in the tool had Claude fix them immediately.

I think this is pretty cool because writing it myself would probably take a whole day or so.

You can find the endresult here.

A client-server architecture where multiple notifications can be scheduled remotely.