I don't have any apps that do this without my permission but I actually appreciate my KDE Connect pausing my computers music or videos when I get a phone call.
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The thing that most annoys me is that there is no way I have found to limit the frequency of notifications, particularly for group chats which sometimes send rapid-fire notifications as a conversation starts that I'm not a part of.
I'm driving, I can't read and reply to texts, I'm listening to an audio book, and I just keep getting my book interrupted with pings and it keeps repeating the same phrase over and over. I don't want to put my phone on Do Not Disturb because I still want to be available for a phone call, and I don't want to forget and leave the phone in DND after I'm done driving. That shouldn't be the only fix.
There should be a way to limit notifications to only occur once every X seconds/minutes. If I haven't grabbed my phone to check the first 3 notifications in the last 6 seconds, why would the 4th one be necessary? If 3 more notifications would have pinged in that time, too bad. They can all just collectively shut up until that time limit has passed.
I've been told that this sort of feature exists on some devices but I have found no way to do it on my Samsung S24.
On Android you can set Do Not Disturb mode to allow calls from your favorites. That's what I do because when I'm sleeping I don't want texts to come through but if an emergency comes up I want to be reachable.
That's how I literally have my phone set up 247, you can reach me if I want you to, otherwise I'll get to you when I look at my phone if I feel like it.
#blessed
I do that too, but I only want my actual favorites through if I'm, say, in a work meeting, or at the movies or something when I might turn on my Do Not Disturb. If my wife or mom needs to get ahold of me, they can. But I don't want to be that restricted just for a car ride if a friend wants to call and talk or a work colleague has an issue or something.
The BuzzKill app for Android allows you to do this, it's been a game changer for me.
It allows me to choose whether I want to auto-mute notifications when they are sent within X seconds of eachother in the same group chat.

What you're looking for was added to core Android since Android 15.
Have you checked in your settings thoroughly?
With specific DND settings and the various notifications options, you can achieve several different levels of "being notified" all under your control.
If on older Android versions than 15, a mix of DND settings set to detect driving and/or a tasker or similar app group to set the notifications for specific apps to go into "snooze" would also achieve the same effects.
There's also at least one open source project I saw on my brief search that had an app that basically mimics the notification cooldown system but I didn't linger enough to determine project state.
I have Android 16 installed. Searching the settings doesn't show any feature called "notification cooldown"
Just googled it and found: "Because Samsung uses its own One UI interface over Android, this native menu option may not appear on certain Galaxy models or One UI versions"
Thanks Samsung.
It would probably take a separate app to override the notification behavior.
Android is so fragmented as an ecosystem, any time you read about new feature X in Android version Y, assume it only applies to Pixel and AOSP based custom ROMs. Sometimes you'll be wrong but generally it's just pointless to assume other people have the same features as you unfortunately.
WhatsApp lets you silence a conversation for a few different time windows.
I also think you can set Do not disturb to allow (specific) calls through.
(On Android)
"Everyone" (in the media culture - you know, the ones who are paid to do so) seems to be saying that LLMs are taking over the world, solving hundreds of years old math problems and the like...
Meanwhile I have yet to see a single new feature produced even partially by this A"I".
Ah example might be: when I am driving (or as a proxy, when connected to a Bluetooth device, either a specific one or any one) disable all SMS notifications, while allowing calls to go through. That doesn't even need fucking AGI - it just makes sense!!! So like, do it already!?
I know on iOS you can set up a “focus” for different situations like driving. Then you can limit notifications to only certain people or none at all. It will automatically activate when your phone connects to your car.
You could also set one up for listening to music or audiobooks and configure it to have reduced interruptions.
I would assume that android would have something similar.
Android has Do Not Disturb, which since 99% of all phone calls are spam these days, has to be left on permanently. You can either block or allow all SMS texts. You can also set custom notification tones for each group chat... but making those change depending upon driving is a whole other matter.
The person I responded to mentioned Samsung, which I think has something that might work along those lines. Though that's an entirely separate registration, with email address (and obviously your phone number), and an entirely separate corporate app store, over and above all that already with Google.
iOS forces you to sell your soul to them in order to enter their walled garden, but once you do they take great care of you, in most ways, even if as they choose rather than as you would wish.
I set mine to silent all the time anyway, and have it mounted on the dash so I’ll see it go off. If I miss something, I mean I’m driving so whatever, it’s not the end of the world.
The problem is, Android is not your OS, it's Google's OS. They decide how it works, not you, damn peasant!
(Ditto for Ios and Apple, probably)
The website for my workout program does this for the exercise demonstration videos.
You don't fucking talk in them, so why isn't it a gif?
what makes you think it's your music
What makes you think they're not listening to their own band?
I use Cronometer to log my food and I’m too cheap to pay for it. Their ads play music and interrupt! What’s worse, when there’s nothing playing, it will even output af music ON SPEAKER! WTF
You should try DNS adblocking.
https://mullvad.net/en/help/dns-over-https-and-dns-over-tls
Just set your private DNS to "base.dns.mullvad.net"
Mullvad is shutting down their DNS
Shit. What are the alternatives?
Mullvad recommended Quad9 when they announced the shutdown. They said it's because they think Quad9 is doing a better job of it than they can, so it's a pretty serious recommendation.
Worth a read, it's not too long: https://mullvad.net/en/blog/shutting-down-our-public-encrypted-dns-servers-and-sponsoring-quad9-instead
ControlD if you want ad filtering for free without limits/registration. (Paid Registration possible for additional services/detailed filtering)
NextDNS/Adguard if you want to register but they have limits on their free plans.
Selfhosted if you have some technical knowledge.
https://dns.njal.la/ this is from one of the og piratebay people
And those apps that decide that a notification should lower the volume of the music...WHO TOLD YA YOU COULD??
What's worse for me is apps that think not pausing music or even worse podcasts or videos is acceptable behavior when playing a notification.
On Samsung phones, you can download Sound Assistant from the Samsung store and turn on Multi Sound. Prevents most of this.
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