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Someone told me you can download something that will restrict your internet access, ie. a timer that you can set to turn off after a specified time. We are trying to reduce our internet time as we spend far too long online and don't have any willpower! Has anyone heard of this?

Your internet time or your kids?

Programs which do this are usually designed for adults to monitor their children's web surfing. Usually you set a password so you can override it. There seems little point of doing this if you are the one who you are trying to restrict since you will know the password and just type it in.

On mine I go into system preferences and then accounts and I can restrict access/ set times. My kids have accounts on mine so I have parental controls set on them.

This is a macbook, btw.

Thanks, chaps.

On Firefox you need to download a tool called Leechblock; on Google Chrome there is a similar download called StayFocused. I 'm not sure what there is on other browsers. Leechblock and StayFocused differ from parental controls and suchlike because they allow you to fully commit yourself -- you can't override them by inputting the administrator password. They aren't infallible, so you have to use a bit of thought and tinkering to block yourself effectively.

Correction: it's called StayFocusd (i.e. it misses out the "e")

Freedom is also good.