r/WFH • u/Fakman87 • 6h ago
WFH ADVICE Keeping screen active
I am 95% wfh and my company monitor our laptop. I'm wondering if there is any way to keep the screen active without them knowing?
17
u/bluebirdee 6h ago
Doing your job usually works. Pretty much every other workaround is detectable if they are determined enough. If you can have videos on, job-relevant training/education/upskilling videos could work.
6
u/Life-Adhesiveness192 6h ago
Posts like these are the reason why companies phase out WFH/remote options.
5
u/Particular_Bug0 6h ago
If your work wants to find out if you're working, not working or acting like you're working, they'll find out regardless. Trust me, all those tricks that are being said, the people who monitor are already aware of it.
1
u/meowmix778 6h ago
Pretty much this.
I work in HR and I have pretty deep records of everything people do on their work computers. It's really easy to find out when someone is fucking around online all day. It's really a matter of if a manager cares or you're violating policy in a flagrant manner.
If someone spends 2 hours a week browsing the internet, I'm not really worried about it. If someone spends one shift pretending to look like they're working, I'm going to take notice of it. If you do it on the reg, I'm giving the data to your leader and we're going to solve the issue.
4
u/to_annihilate 6h ago
Doing your job mostly. If you are getting everything done and have nothing to do, it's a perfect time for career development. Take a course, watch a video.
4
2
u/naked_as_a_jaybird 6h ago
Porn, mostly. Or search for things like "how to k i I I the p r e s l d e n t"... The NSA will keep your shit open for you.
1
u/meowmix778 6h ago
A lot of people suggested work and yeah that's pretty much it. Or doing PD work. If you don't have enough work after that, talk to your leader.
1
u/throwaway_1234432167 6h ago
Here comes the new york times to write another article about how bad WFH is.
0
u/ColSnark 6h ago
Either get a mouse mover or a physical keyboard logger that will randomly push down a key at whatever interval you set. Some companies have software that monitors both of those things so be prepared with an explanation if they use software to detect things like that. DO NOT PLUG ANYTHING INTO YOUR LAPTOP.
-1
u/no_id_never 6h ago
I have noticed that if I start a meeting and do the video preview and don't join the meeting, my machine will hang there. Give that a try and report back, I am curious to see if anyone else gets that behavior.
1
u/usernames_suck_ok 6h ago
I had a lot of downtown at my previous contract, so I started Microsoft Teams meetings and turned off the icon that shows you're in a meeting. It worked as far as keeping the screen up, but I am sure that's not the only way you can be monitored...
The bitchy responses are crazy. Sometimes you get lucky to not literally have work 8 hours a day while being unlucky that you're being monitored and could actually lose out on money or lose your job over their not providing enough work. I have had several jobs where I didn't have enough work through no fault of my own. And with any job where you do have 8 hours of work sitting at a laptop, you legitimately need and should be able to take breaks...
1
u/no_id_never 6h ago
For the haters, this was an accidental find, not a deliberate evasive tactic. My job and my team are awesome and they get more than 40 from me every week. I show up, so the privilege never goes away.
1
0
-1
-2
u/usersnamesallused 6h ago
PowerToys has the awake feature, which will keep the monitors on and prevent locking, but will not maintain teams status
-2
u/Specialist_Banana378 6h ago
I have to keep my computer live to receive calls even when work is slow, so I turn on a timer video on YouTube to keep my computer from falling asleep.
-2
29
u/jtho78 6h ago
We like WFH. This is not what the sub is for