Android app Tactile Clock vibrates the current time

Posted by Eric Scheibler at May 6, 2016

I’ve created a small Android app, which vibrates the current time. To start the vibration the display must be locked. Then press the power button twice in a row with a delay between 500 and 1500 milliseconds.

Update 2024: Version 2.2.0 supports Android 14

The program is started automatically after booting is finished. It supports all devices with Android version >= 4.0 and is licensed under the GPL V3.

Basically there exist two different vibration pattern: A short vibration stands for the digit 1 and a long one for the digit 5. So the 2 is represented by two consecutive short vibrations, the 6 by a long and a short one and so on. The 0 constitutes an exception with two long vibrations.

Examples:

01:16 =   ..     s ... s .. l . s
02:51 =   .. s . s ... l ..     s
10:11 = s .. l . l ... s ..     s

Explanation:

The time is processed digit by digit. s = short, l = long. A leading zero at the hour field is omitted. To simplify the recognition of the vibration pattern, there exist three kind of gabs with different durations, marked by the number of dots in the examples above. A single dot stands for the pause between two vibrations, two dots symbolize the separation of two digits within the hour and minute field and three dots split hours and minutes.

Download and source code: