Focus Buddy

Boost your productivity with Tommy, your new Focus Buddy!

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Focus Buddy

Focus Buddy is an immersive productivity app developed at the 2024 XR Creator Con (XRCC) by the Hyper XR team. Part of the Utility & Design Track, it's designed to help people with ADHD maintaining concentration on specific tasks. The app features an AI powered assistant to simplifies tasks into manageable steps, a Pomodoro timer for efficient time management, and an environment dimming option to safely reduce distractions.

Main features

AI powered Focus Buddy Meet Tommy, an AI voice assistant and cute tomato companion, who helps you break down complex tasks into simple visual to-do lists.

Distraction reduction Transform your workspace by dimming the distracting environment while maintaining full visibility in your focus areas.

Pomodoro technique Embrace the Pomodoro Technique by rotating Tommy as a kitchen timer and engaging in focus sessions followed by rewarding breaks.

How we built it

Focus Buddy was built in Unity 2022.3.13f1 for the Meta Quest 2, Pro and 3 using the Meta XR SDK and the OpenAI API. ShapesXR was used to ideate and create early sketches. 3D assets were created in Blender.

Design process

1) Decided on the way of blocking the environment after visualization in ShapesXR and technical review. There was an option of putting blocker walls in the environment. 3) Prioritized features. 4) Created paper storyboards to align on the feature scope and user flow. 5) Iteratively prototyped the experience in ShapesXR for UX tests and technical reviews. 6) Created 3D assets in Blender. Downloaded assets from Google icons and Google fonts. 7) Implemented the concept in Unity with the Meta SDK and the OpenAI API.

Challenges we ran into

The team faced various obstacles that slowed down progress and collaboration. These challenges encompassed ineffective feature prioritization, communication gaps resulting in misunderstandings, and disagreements over conceptual approaches. Additionally, the use of novel technologies contributed to frequent software bugs due to insufficient or outdated documentation. Addressing these issues became imperative to regain momentum and successfully meet project objectives.

Lessons learned

Throughout XRCC, we learned several key lessons. Foremost, we found the mentor feedback incredibly valuable for shaping our ideas and making smart decisions. The help and guidance throughout the Hack was great. Plus, we learned to focus on building an essential version of our product first, saving time and effort later. We also discovered the importance of not getting caught up in making too many design changes that could delay progress. These lessons helped us move forward efficiently and effectively in our project development.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

Focus Buddy shifted from extending reality to diminishing it in Mixed Reality (MR), an application that has been explored in numerous augmented reality (AR) projects but represents significant innovation in mixed reality (MR). Besides, we supported each other extensively during ideating and developing, dedicated ourselves tirelessly through the night to complete the project and its packaging. Despite fatigue and occasional frustration, we also managed to have a great time and consistently supported each other.

What's next for Focus Buddy

Possible features: 1) Cutting off other real world features. 2) New feature: Blur the environment instead of dimming. Maybe someday it will be possible with the Meta XR SDK. 3) New feature: Change to virtual environment with Passthrough Windows. 4) Add resizing Passthrough Windows. 5) Add selecting objects as focus areas. 6) Add Scene API

Team Members

Development Katrina Rizakova Laura Magdaleno Amaro Leonid Barsht

UI/UX Design Denys Babenko Nikita Khudiakov

Crafted with Love by Hyper XR at XRCC '24

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