1 minute read

I was toying with applications that block time-wasting websites in the hope that the friction would lead me to be more productive.

Self Control is one solution.

Annoyingly Self Control isn’t easily stopped once a timer is started, and the application doesn’t come with an uninstaller.

Usually when uninstalling apps on OSX I make use of a very helpful freeware program App Cleaner.

App Cleaner found most of the installed files and removed them, however if you’ve already started a blocking timer then there are a few other things that we need to clean up.

  • Stop Self Control from automatically restarting - launchctl unload -w /Library/LaunchDaemons/org.eyebeam.selfcontrold.plist (App Cleaner had already removed the plist file).
  • Kill the Self Control process - sudo killall SelfControl.
  • Remove the timer lock file - sudo rm /etc/SelfControl.lock.

With the process dead and unloaded from launchd we can now remove the firewall rules that were added.

First edit the root pf config file sudo vim /etc/pf.conf and remove the load anchor "org.eyebeam" from "/etc/pf.anchors/org.eyebeam" entry.

Then remove the anchor file sudo rm /etc/pf.anchors/org.eyebeam.

Reload pf with sudo pfctl -f /etc/pf.conf.

Finally we need to remove any host entries that Self Control added by removing the Self Control block from the /etc/hosts file sudo vim /etc/hosts.

Websites previously blocked should now be accessible. To overcome DNS caching issues you may need to run sudo killall -HUP mDNSResponder.

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