Lock in Clock in

Inspiration

Midterm season has students constantly stressing and going on social media as a release.

What it does

The Lock in Clock in is a dual-function alarm clock and study tool designed to boost productivity and cut distractions. Place the phone in the box and simply press the button to "clock in." While studying, see a motivational quote on the screen and be sure to "lock in" or try not to at your own risk. When tired, relax with a dinosaur game!

How we built it

To build the physical box, we laser-cut plywood and measured precise dimensions to securely fit each component. We used an Arduino-based microcontroller and programmed it in C++ to handle core functions like the countdown timer and alarm triggering. For audio output, we connected a speaker and integrated an app that plays MP3 files to serve as the alarm sound. Additionally, we connected a display to show motivational quotes and even included a version of the classic dinosaur game to provide a light mental break between study sessions.

Challenges we ran into

One major challenge was aligning the laser-cut plywood box with the exact dimensions of our components — small miscalculations created fitting issues that we had to iterate on (i.e. sanding down the areas). We also encountered difficulties implementing the countdown timer functionality that we resolved by manually assigning each pin to correspond with the specific segments needed to display the correct numbers, effectively hardcoding the countdown sequence. Additionally, while we initially considered 3D printing the enclosure, the estimated print time of nearly 20 hours made it impractical, leading us to pivot to laser-cut plywood as a more efficient alternative. However, locking in on a singular idea after continuously changing it and clocking in at the right times rather than sleeping in were by far the largest challenges for our group.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

We are just really proud that we were able to successfully build a cohesive working alarm and study timer system that integrates MP3 audio and a display that delivers motivational quotes and a mini game quite seamlessly. We had so many convoluted ideas to start out with that ultimately came together to make not just a bunch of our ideas work, but a cohesive combination of our ideas that we personally would use in our everyday lives.

What we learned

Before this project, laser cutting and I2C portable communication were completely unfamiliar to us but with this project, these became critical components as laser-cutting was required after 3D printing was no longer an option and implementing I2C communication to drive multiple OLED displays, allowed us to output content on a larger, user-friendly screen using minimal pin connections—a key factor in keeping our hardware setup streamlined and functional.