04 · RUSH HOUR
Rush Hour
A focus app built around timelapse accountability
The situation
The starting observation was simple: even small tasks get hard when you're constantly pulled away, and ambition without focus doesn't actually get you anywhere. Most focus apps respond to that by just tracking numbers — minutes focused, streaks kept.
Thought process
Tracking a number doesn't make someone feel like they showed up for themselves. What does is being able to look back at a session and actually see it — how many times did I get distracted, how did I spend the time, did I really show up for what I said I wanted to do. So instead of a leaderboard, Rush Hour records a timelapse of the session itself, something to reflect on afterward and something you can genuinely share, which builds in accountability without turning focus into a competition.
Engineering decisions
App blocking runs on Apple's Screen Time APIs — FamilyControls/DeviceActivity — with a dedicated Shield Action and Shield Configuration extension, plus a jailbreak-detection monitor so the block can't just be quietly bypassed. A WidgetKit extension gives at-a-glance session status from the home screen. It's the most actively iterated of the four projects — 139 commits in — which tracks with it being the one that's already been through a real public exhibition and a round of user feedback.
My contribution
Rush Hour had its first public exhibition last month, at the Apple Developer Academy's own showcase — the first time real users incorporated it into actual work sessions and gave feedback on what helped and what to fix. That feedback is currently shaping the pre–App Store refinement pass.