Software that Schedules Your Appointments For You? 50
Lappie asks: "Say you've got a couple of things to do. Usually, you write them down in your diary, PDA or via some online calendaring solution. In every case YOU decide when to carry out a task based on it's priorities etc. That's not how I like to work. Having used a Psion Revo for a few years now, I got quite used to a program called Mentor which schedules my tasks for me. It may sound scary to some, but it actually works quite well. With my Psion dying on me, I'm trying to find an alternative to Mentor either as Windows, Linux , web-based or PDA based software. However, I haven't been able to find anything after several days of googling around, and I'm getting so desperate that I even considered closed source payware. To date, I can't find a comparable product in the market. Is Mentor and its capabilities a unique piece of software, or have I not looked carefully enough?"
"Based on three criteria, the program determines what tasks you have to do on a given day. The criteria are how committed you are to carrying out the task (committed / must do, fairly committed / upcoming 2-3 days, bonus), when the task should be completed (ASAP, soon / this week, sometime / this month) and how long you plan for the task to take (15m, hour, half a day or a day). Mentor knows how/where to plan tasks because for each, so called, role you play (e.g., Sysadmin, Webmaster, Home etc.) you can assign (repeating) time slots over a day. So Mentor places a task in a time slot when the duration fits the slot and when the 'urgency/priority' variables fit the distance between today and the date when a task has to be completed. Of course, Mentor automatically respects the appointments that you have, and after a quick reschedule every morning, you're all set to go for the day."
Is not this scheduling problem NP-complete??? (Score:3, Funny)
Paul B.
P.S. Good luck in your search though!
Re:Is not this scheduling problem NP-complete??? (Score:3, Interesting)
Actually, it's not NP, it's most certainly polynomial. Turns out that this "scheduling problem" can be arranged into a matroid [wolfram.com], and therefore a simple greedy algorithm [wolfram.com] will work. Basically, this will *always* just end up with the next "highest priority" item that fits into the current time slot.
(For a final note, I'm not in any way affiliated with mathworld.wolfram.com, but it is a useful reference.) ;-)
You are right, of course! (Score:2)
Paul B.
I know the product you are looking for. (Score:5, Funny)
I've since gone back to bachelor 1.0 and don't really think about upgrading.
Re:I know the product you are looking for. (Score:1)
Maybe you'll upgrade to Wife 2.0 in the future?
Re:I know the product you are looking for. (Score:2, Funny)
Re:I know the product you are looking for. (Score:2, Funny)
Re:I know the product you are looking for. (Score:2)
Well, I've been running bachelor v4.0 for some years now (longterm customer), and I've considered upgrading to girlfriend v3.5 or higher (want a newer model) for a while.
I've been reluctant to even condider wife v1.0 at all because I hear it has come incompatibi
Well... (Score:5, Informative)
If it ain't broke, don't fix it, right?
Re:Well... (Score:1)
(I saw one going for about $80) if you really depend on it that much
Wulisoft even has a link to an EPOC emulator that you could use to run mentor if you had to.
Re:Well... (Score:1)
Re:Well... (Score:1)
Above and Beyond (Score:4, Informative)
Been using versions of it for many years, and can't fault it. The web site looks like a leftover from 1995, but don't hold that against them. Windows only, and doesn't run under Wine (at least not the last time I tried).
It supports tasks, projects, statuses, alarms, all that sort of stuff. Notes against items are just text files - easy to search or edit externally if you want to. Tasks can be imported or exported too if you wish.
Re:Above and Beyond (Score:1)
Re:Above and Beyond (Score:1)
Psions and Mooks (Score:4, Informative)
Or you could just get another Psion off of eBay. They'll probably be available for a long time to come.
I have to mention that overdependence on "Mook" software can lead to loss of actual identity, as described in Bruce Sterling's fiction.
Re:Psions and Mooks (Score:1)
Indeed I'm finding out the hard way regarding software dependence although I'm unfamiliar with Sterling's work.
Re:Psions and Mooks (Score:2)
Have you tried running this application on a Symbian device? There are a lot of those these days, though I guess they're usually more expensive than a plain PDA.
Sterling has occasionally played with the idea of "fade". The idea is that in the future some busy/powerful people use fancy AI software to mediate their interactions with the rest of humanity. Whic
That's a good one... (Score:1)
Latest schedule (Score:2)
Re:Latest schedule (Score:1)
Palm app (Score:1)
Does PlanMyDay [sourceforge.net] sound like it will do the job for you?
Re:Palm app (Score:1)
Re:Palm app (Score:1)
You could also try the Palm emulator, POSE, to get a feel for the available software before you decide to lay out any cash.
Manna (Score:4, Interesting)
Life Balance (Score:2)
I read in some forums about the software Life Balance [llamagraphics.com], which sounds like you're describing. You tell it what percentage of time you want to spend on certain things, and it will schedule it for you.
I've never used this, nor know much about it. I've been following the forums [gettingthingsdone.com] on the book Getting Things Done [amazon.com], and some people have liked it.
After years of PDAs, I still like the simplicity of a pen on pencil. Flexable, too!
Re:Life Balance (Score:1)
Re:Life Balance (Score:2)
Taskline Task Management for Microsoft Outlook (Score:2)
Taskline [taskline.info] is a plug-in for Microsoft Outlook. One of the deficiencies, some users say, of Outlook is it's inability to properly express the time needed to complete tasks versus your actual scheduled appointments. So I'm guessing Taskline works just as your system works now, and that it's what you want.
I love it. It helps me see if projects are actually feasible, and it helps me make better ed
Re:Taskline Task Management for Microsoft Outlook (Score:1)
Mentor with Voice (Score:3, Funny)
Organiser: Acknowledged. This appointment is scheduled for.... 5:50PM.
Guy: I was hoping for some time before 12 noon.
Organiser: Sorry, you all booked up. [snikers... and all backed up too]
Guy: But I already have a peeper!
Organiser: I do not understand. [Yes, you have nice brown eye protruding from your read-end. For the rest of the day I hope I'm kept in the front pockets of your pants.]
Guy: Right. So what am I scheduled to be doing now?
Organiser: You have a meeting at the unemployment office. [Patethic carbon based life form]
my own project (Score:2, Interesting)
A demo is at http://www.mekhaye.net/webdev/prioritexter [mekhaye.net] and a .zip of the program (view README after unzi
Re:my own project (Score:2)
Re:my own project (Score:1)
[heh heh... "I don't support your dreams!" etc.]
Yes, I figure I'll tinker with it for another few weeks after work, then put it on sourceforge (so it's at least fully functional within its narrow parameters before I ask people to tinker with it too). In the meantime, please play with the source, and let me know your ideas or code changes.
Also, please email me if this project interests you and I'll email
LifeBalance (Score:2)
Palm and Windows, Windows CE I think is coming up.