Vitalwell

The app that watches the screen so parents can watch their kids.

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VitalWell

A cross-platform digital wellbeing app for Linux, Windows, and Android.

"The app that watches the screen so parents can watch their kids."

Inspiration

I grew up watching my younger cousins glued to their screens — and I saw how hard it was for my aunt to keep track. Android had a built-in tool, but what about the laptop in the living room? The old family PC running Linux? I wanted one place where parents could see the full picture, not just one piece of it. And as someone who knows how easily a single notification can derail an entire afternoon, I wanted to build something that actually helps people with ADHD reclaim their focus too.

What It Does

VitalWell is a cross-platform digital wellbeing app for Linux, Windows, and Android that helps families understand and gently manage screen time.

For Individuals

  • Track your daily and weekly device usage
  • See which apps consume your time
  • Set healthy limits for yourself

For Parents

  • Create an account and link your children's devices
  • Monitor screen time from one dashboard
  • Set PIN-protected restrictions for specific apps and bedtime hours
  • Emergency bypasses built in, because real life doesn't follow schedules

For Eye Health

  • Full-screen break reminders gently prompt you to look away from the screen at regular intervals

For Focus

Three built-in assist tools to help you stay on task:

Feature Description
Focus Glow Glowing screen borders to gently grab your attention (Android)
Focus Cover Adjustable black overlays that block distracting parts of the screen — draggable hinge lets you resize coverage like split-screen (Android Quick Settings tile)
Distraction Destroyer Browser extension for Firefox and Chromium that strips clutter from webpages

Privacy by Design

Your app usage data is encrypted on-device with a password only you know.

  • App names are encrypted before they touch our database
  • We cannot read your app names or usage data
  • The encryption password is not stored anywhere — not in our database, not on your device
  • If you lose your encryption password, your data stays private — even from us

How We Built It

I used OpenAI Codex as my coding partner, prompting it to build the Flutter UI, native platform integrations, and encryption layer while I focused on architecture and design decisions.

Challenges We Ran Into

  • Flutter cross-platform debugging across Linux, Windows, and Android
  • Building a genuine privacy layer where even the developer cannot peek at user data
  • Synchronization between devices with different OS architectures

Accomplishments We're Proud Of

VitalWell is privacy-first by design. We built this because we believe you should own your data — not rent it from a company that reads it.

What We Learned

Building for three operating systems with one codebase teaches you where abstractions leak. "Cross-platform" doesn't mean "identical" — it means respecting what makes each OS different while keeping the experience coherent.

What's Next for VitalWell

  • iOS and macOS support to cover every screen in a household
  • Smarter AI-driven usage insights (e.g., "You tend to scroll social media after 9 PM — want a gentle nudge?")
  • Community-driven focus presets for ADHD users
  • Open-sourcing the core to let the community audit, improve, and trust the code
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