Darryl's dashboard

@Rael: I tried it too and it seems to be working, except in lists (multiple tasks in a single email). Is it possible that it does not work yet in that scenario?

@Aitese: you are asking Sandy to send multiple reminders for the same task, which does not seem to be supported at the moment. Maybe start a new discussion? – Olivier Gourment, on July 24, 2008 13:43

I just used this fir the first time with an actual upcoming meal, at first I exprerimented with the possibility of using the tag for multiple reminders:

Remind me about Cassie's meal at Ginny's in Bromley at 6pm 15th August @reminder 9pm 14th August @reminder 4pm 15th August

The outcome was totally borked:

I added these to your calendar:

#1 Fri, 15/8 6:00pm Cassie's meal at Ginny's in Bromley 4pm
- email reminder at 5:00pm
- tagged with @reminder

#2 Fri, 25/7 7:00am Cassie's meal at Ginny's in Bromley
- email reminder on Thu, 14/8 at 9:00pm
- tagged with @reminder

Maybe this IS possible but I'm doing it wrong? The idea was I needed to know to put some clothes out the night before, even shave perhaps as I usually trot off to work in the morning looking like a bum, but I still wanted reminding in the afternoon as I also rush out of the office like a kid at the end of school and would not get on the right route to the restaurant.

Is there a way to use multiple tags? I decided to tell Sandy to forget these first 2 and tried with just the evening reminder and the system works flawlessly, great work guys!

Hi Olivier. Sorry it took so long — sometimes this is the nature of these things and why we usually don't mention specifics about scheduling, etc. – Rael Dornfest, on July 24, 2008 06:32

This sounds promising. I am just wondering why it was said to be due 6 months ago? – Olivier Gourment, on July 24, 2008 02:04

I don't think it's fully documented anywhere.. But I know you can use
@reminder July 13 4:30pm (to specify exact times)
and
@reminder X hours prior (or any relative time like minutes or days)

That's brilliant!

What syntax works with this? Or is there a link to a help page?

i.e. @reminder at 3pm, @reminder on Sunday etc.

One of the new features of Sandy is the "@reminder" tag, used like so

remind me to go to the dentist 8/24 10:30am @reminder 1 days prior

Any news on this?

I think that Iavardera and Aitese have it pretty well thought out. I second their ideas.

It should be possible to both SCHEDULE an event and specify a REMINDER for the event in the same email. I will point out that it should also be possible to set *multiple* reminders for the event in the same email. Each reminder having its own scheduled time, and its own tags. Different calendars let you do this. (Google Calendar, etc.)

It seems that the best way to schedule reminders would be to use multiple sentences. Just like they've been suggesting. Trying to cram everything into one sentence wouldn't allow for support of multiple reminders. Maybe Sandy should pay attention to where the period is and then interpret the following sentences accordingly. If the sentence starts with the word "remind", then it's a reminder for the event scheduled in the previous sentence.

The time/date in the reminders should be allowed to be relative to the time the event is scheduled for. I expect that the word "before" will be used a lot.

Format:
> Remember A at time/date. (The event is scheduled. Either a default reminder is scheduled or no reminder is scheduled.)

> Remember A at time/date. Remind B at time/date @email. Remind C at time/date @sms.

Examples:
> Remember A at 09/12/07 at 7pm. Remind me to leave at 6 pm @email. Remind me to stop and get chips at 6:40 pm @sms.

> Sandy, remember Meeting with Joe on XXFeb08 12:30pm. Remind me to prepare 1 day before @email. Remind me to leave 1 hour before @sms.

Maybe this idea would be easier to implement using the tag "@reminder". The keyword could be used to specify a reminder that attaches to the previous sentence. (We already have the tag @noreminder, so this tag would make sense.) The advantage to this is twofold. First, Sandy doesn't have to distinguish between "remember" and "remind", instead, a new command is being added. Second, this might make it easier for Sandy to spot where the reminder commands were.

> Remind me about GZA at KOKO on 09/12/07 at 7pm. @reminder to leave 45 minutes before @sms. @reminder to buy chips 1 hour 30 minutes before @email.

Hi Iavardera!

Of course you shouldn't have to do that in 3 strokes when just one would do the trick.

And absolutely we're working on it — and I think you'll all be rather happy with both the first and later iterations.

—Rael

If you are really working on it then I'll pile-on.

There are times I'd like two reminders. Say the day before a meeting to gather my files, and an hour before the meeting to get me out the door. If you could add text/context to the reminder it would be awesome.

Sandy, remember Meeting with Joe on Friday, XXFeb08 12:30pm. Remind me Prep for 1 day before. Remind me Leave for 1 hour before.

then the reminder would sift the label from the reminder "Prep for" and append the event "Meeting with Joe" to result in an SMS/email that says "Prep for Meeting with Joe" and "Leave for Meeting with Joe"..

I realize I could do this by entering 3 events, but the idea that they could be tied together, and the reminders shift with the meeting time if rescheduled could be more powerful.

Howdy, folks.

This is all incredibly useful input — particularly given that I am currently hard at work with Sandy on what turns out to be a nice wrap-up of all you suggest. While I'm always loathe to put a timeline on particular features, you should expect to see something (at least in testing form) from Sandy in the coming week or so.

Thanks for your continued patience on this front — and know that I'm right there in line with you waiting for Sandy to support this functionality.

—Rael

On my second try it worked.

The 2006 dates were just my example. Thanks for checking. I am going to try and put this into daily use and see if I have any feedback. I sure wish I could spec both the appointment and a reminder in a single email.

Hm, that's odd, as it definitely works. Well, it didn't work for me once, but that seems to have been a bug that has since been cleaned up.

Although...are you sure you wrote 15 Feb *2006* and 14 Feb *2002*? Could Sandy have been confused by the fact that she hadn't been born (or at least was in some sort of stasis) then? ;-)

I tried what you tried and it works. Then I spotted that your dates are strange. Did you really want a reminder about something in 2006 in 2002? If that's just a typo it could be that you are getting the html emails. Someone mentioned there was a bug with Sandy reading replies to her own html emails.

This did not work for me, and in fact rescheduled the appointment for the reminder time I wanted. Here is my syntax:

Sandy, Remind me Mazda oil change Friday 15 feb 2006 at 9am

and my reply to the confirmation:

remind me at 12 noon 14 Feb 2002

This moved my appointment to the reminder time when I checked online. I have auto confirmation on - at least I believe I do, I always receive confirmations without @reply

I had actually considered this shortly after my reply when I suddenly realised we have a process here at work that is actually called a "schedule" which sometimes we have to run outside the allotted time. I was thinking there would be confusion if for example I said "Remind me about emergency schedule on Friday morning"

So the word Schedule is out, but I do believe this problem arises from the lack of distinction between the word REMEMBER and REMIND.

I'm sure everyone knows these are two different, although related, words. If I ask someone to remember to meet me somewhere I'm not also asking him or her to remind me of the meeting. You tell Sandy to remember something and you have to explicitly tell her @noreminder to stop her reminding you. I should be able to ask her to REMEMBER something and then set a REMINDER as a separate element. This is how most schedulers I've ever used operate. My Outlook calendar does not remind me of an entry or sound an alarm unless I expressly ask it to. Neither does my phone. The example should be:

Remind me of A at time/date (Sandy does the default reminder before the event based on your default settings)

Remember A at time/date (The event is scheduled but no reminder is sent...also good for To-Do list entries)

Remember A at time/date. Remind me at time/date (Sandy schedules the event and reminds you when you want)

The trouble comes when you want to use the shortcuts as remind and remember both begin with r, but I’m just throwing ideas out there.

Perhaps it can be done with a second sentence that follows the syntax of the reply to confirmation.

Schedule meeting at such and such time. Remind me of meeting at such and such time.

That would work when it is appended to an email. A single email sent only to sandy could have the meeting time in the subject line, and the reminder time in the body.

From other threads, it seems the Sandy team are considering the best way to implement a way for us to set non-default reminder times - obviously it has to be something that involves as little possibility of confusion as possible. Your example looks good, but what if I write

"R check Andrew's schedule 3.30pm" - meaning that when Andrew gets home from school I need to check his schedule - but I want the reminder at my default time - there are so many possiblities, I'd rather they'd spend some time and implement it well, rather than introduce it sooner and cause confusion.

In the meantime, if you want set up a reminder via email, it will involve the two emails as I described.

From using notsheep's suggestion I can see that now my appointment is shown with two fields:

Scheduled at and Reminder at.

So therefore shouldn't Sandy be made to understand that in a single email.

For example in my first query I would say to Sandy:

"Schedule GZA at KOKO on 09/12/07 at 7pm. Remind me at 9am"

If the word Scedule is not explicitly set then it would default to the Reminder time like it does now.