Timer Description Syntax!

There is just a little bit that you have to learn to be able to use this timer well. Take the placeholder example:

5x2'(2')

It's not an equation, thankfully! If you read that from left to ride, it would read as "Five sets of two minutes of work followed by two minutes of rest."

The first number followed by the "x" indicates sets. These can be sets of anything! I'm interested in Kettlebell Sport, so they're sets of long cycle (usually) for me.

The second number, the one not in parenthesis, is the number of minutes you intend to spend doing something. The apostrophe means "minutes."

That last number, the one that is in parenthesis, is the number of minutes you intend to take a break from whatever it is you do during the work time.

So, what if you had to do three sets of three minutes of work followed by two minutes of rest?

Well, that would look like this: 3x3'(2')

Some Questions You Might Have

Why the specific syntax?

I wanted something flexible enough to accomodate the changing times on the workouts that my coach sends me. The specific sytnax is useful because it has some clear markings that indicate where one number ends and another begins.

Why a specific mark for minutes if that's all you're allowed to time?

Because I intend to open this up to seconds, as well. That's just less relevant for me at this very moment and so I didn't build it in for the first launch. If that's really relevant for you, then I apologize! It'll be coming up soon.

Can I use this for things other than Kettlebell Sport?

Yeah! If you can describe it with the timer syntax, then you can use it! I'm not familiar with a lot of other times, though, just the ones I have experience with day-to-day.

Do you have plans to take this further?

Yep! I want to include more ways you can describe timers so you can copy and paste. I want to make it absurdly easy for you to do this, so the program will be responsible for digesting a wide variety of timer notation. It'll take me some time to do this. I'd also like to add other features that might be more useful for those of us that do Kettlebell Sport, such as indications for RPM and stuff. There are probably a lot of things I can do, and I'll definitely get around to some of them.