How to block most websites for a given time

February 28, 2006 10:38 AM

Is there a whitelist-based internet blocker to help me focus on work?

I am finding myself wasting too much time at work surfing the net. I've tried 'just focusing' but it's not working for me. I would like to find a Firefox-compatible program/extension that will prevent me from accessing most of the internet for a certain period of time, but will allow me to access a whitelist of sites that I need to be able to get to do my job. This idea was inspired by Temptation Blocker but that solution won't work for me because there are a handful of (un-fun) sites that I need to access whenever I want. Any ideas?

posted by underwater to Computers & Internet (10 answers total)

Maybe you can modify Lifehacker's Invisibility Cloak Greasemonkey script. Or you can at least use it to block the sites you waste the most time on.
posted by MsMolly at 10:55 AM on February 28, 2006

Until you find one, you can set this or this as your homepage.

(Obviously that works so well for me... But now I at least think twice.)
posted by salvia at 11:48 AM on February 28, 2006

I've been looking for an idea for an extension to help me learn extension development, and this sounds like a great project. I'll let you know if/when I have anything developed!
posted by charmston at 11:49 AM on February 28, 2006

But won't you just unblock stuff if you want to?
posted by crapples at 12:15 PM on February 28, 2006

Don't know if this helps, but sometimes setting an alarm to go off once an hour on your screen can help you to keep track of how much time you're spending online - or to remind you to get offline. You can set up alarms through Outlook, iCal or iAlert (a great little alert program for Macs) - and I'm sure there's probably a Yahoo Widget you could try as well.
posted by rmm at 12:34 PM on February 28, 2006

If you have a linksys router, they have scheduled blocking features.
posted by cellphone at 1:23 PM on February 28, 2006

Set up a proxy.pac file to send requests directly to your whitelist sites, all others to some safe site or to nowhere. Should work even in really old browsers.
posted by gimonca at 4:22 PM on February 28, 2006

But won't you just unblock stuff if you want to?

For the weak willed, you could incorporate an optional cold turkey 'locking' feature, which locks out other sites for a week/fortnight/month after you engage it.
posted by nyterrant at 6:12 PM on February 28, 2006

Response by poster: But won't you just unblock stuff if you want to?

Temptation Blocker has a great response to this. To unblock programs (or to access Temptation Blocker) you need to copy a displayed 32 character random alphanumeric password. Just hard enough to deter you but easy enough to get past if you really need to.

Charmston, if you develop an extension, please let me know!

Set up a proxy.pac file to send requests directly to your whitelist sites

This is probably a good solution but I have no idea what you're talking about or how to do it.
posted by underwater at 11:00 PM on February 28, 2006

Thanks, WCityMike. Once I get sick of lecturing myself, I'll try the chilling blank stare. ;)
posted by salvia at 1:42 AM on March 3, 2006