ClawShorts

YouTube Shorts limiter for Fire TV. Monitors watch time per device and auto-blocks when daily limit is reached.

Invocation

Primary entry point:
CODEBLOCK0

Commands

Command	When to use
INLINECODE0	Check today's usage, remaining quota, daemon health
INLINECODE1

Reset today's counter (all devices or specific IP) | | start | Start the daemon if not running | | stop | Stop the daemon | | history [days] | Show watch history (default 30 days) | | logs [N] | Show last N daemon log lines (default 50) | | list | List all configured devices with per-device config | | setup <IP> [NAME] | First-time setup for a new device | | add <IP> [NAME] | Add another Fire TV | | connect <IP> | Connect ADB to device + auto-detect screen | | enable <IP> / disable <IP> | Enable/disable a device | | config [show\|get\|set\|reset] | View/set global or per-device config | | detect <IP> | Re-detect screen resolution via ADB, update DB |

Detection Logic

Detection requires both conditions to be true simultaneously:

1. 1. Player width < 30% of screen width (configurable per-device)
2. Aspect ratio < 1.3 (portrait — distinguishes Shorts from 16:9 landscape previews)

• - Poll interval: 3 seconds via ADB
• Shorts: ~32% screen width, 9:16 portrait (ar ~0.56)
• Regular video: ~100% screen width, 16:9 landscape (ar ~1.78)
• Home/browse: no video active
• Only actual Shorts playback counts toward limit

Configuration

All detection parameters are stored in SQLite with global defaults and per-device overrides.

Global defaults (shorts config):

key	default	description
INLINECODE15	0.30	player width must be < this ratio of screen width
INLINECODE16

1.3 | portrait if ar < this value |
| shorts_fallback_height_ratio | 0.4 | fallback: player height must exceed this ratio of screen height |
| shorts_delta_cap | 300 | max seconds accumulated per poll |
| default_screen_width | 1920 | fallback assumed screen width |
| default_screen_height | 1080 | fallback assumed screen height |

Per-device overrides — any of the above can be set per-device in the devices table. NULL = use global default.

Config commands:
CODEBLOCK1

Data Locations

• - Database: ~/.clawshorts/clawshorts.db (SQLite)

- config — global detection defaults - devices — per-device settings (IP, name, limit, screen size, thresholds) - daily_usage — daily watch time per device

• - Daemon log: INLINECODE26
• LaunchAgent: INLINECODE27

Requirements

• - adb (Android platform tools)
• Python 3
• Fire TV with ADB debugging enabled
• INLINECODE29 symlink at /opt/homebrew/bin/shorts (optional)

⚠️ Security Notes

ADB has no built-in authentication. Only enable ADB Debugging on a trusted, password-protected home network. Never on public WiFi. Anyone on the same network with ADB enabled can connect to your Fire TV.

This tool only accepts private IP addresses (10.x.x.x, 172.16–31.x.x, 192.168.x.x). Public IPs are rejected to prevent accidental targeting of unrelated hosts.