peraino@gmuvax2.gmu.edu (Bob Peraino) (03/16/91)
>From: dan@Apple.COM (Dan Allen) >It has been just over a year since the HP-48SX was introduced. I have used >mine for just over 13 months now. Here are a few reflections after that use: >Worse yet, it cannot schedule any >birthdays or other periodic events that occur yearly, or even monthly! You can use the smaller units to accomplish this. For example, if, for a repeat interval you put in 365 days, it shows up as 52.1428571429 weeks, the largest unit it understands. I understand what you're saying, but it's not impossible. Here's what I don't like about the alarms, and my solution: Unacknowledged non-repeating alarms will stay pending. So, if you weren't around when the alarm went off, you will know it went off when you get back to the machine. Unacknowledged REPEATING alarms are NOT pending. This, of course, makes some kind of sense, since if it's pending, it won't repeat. HOWEVER, I can't stand this, because if it's not a control alarm and you're not around when it goes off, then it's useless. That's the problem with using it for something like birthdays. I get around this by setting alarms for birthdays as one-time alarms. When they go off, they stay pending, and so you know it went off. Then, instead of acknowledging the alarm, I edit it and bump it up one year. This is all fine, except when you try to use the 48 for appointments and the like, it gets messy. You know what I mean if you've ever turned on the 48, if more than one alarm is pending. This has actually happened to me; I turn it on, an alarm is pending, I happened to know that other alarms are also pending, but I don't want to acknowledge the current one yet. How do I see the other pending alarms? The catalog doesn't help, because it should, but does not, indicate which alarms are past due. This is a pain. The solution is an alarm log, and I am writing one. Once finished, I will make ALL of my alarms control type alarms. The logging software will decide what to do. For example, an alarm to remind me of a meeting would look like: << "Meeting at 10:00" ALMLOG >> ALMLOG sees that it's a string, and displays the message and beeps; BUT it also logs the alarm. If the message were some other object type like a program, it would take appropriate action, and also log the alarm. When I want to see what my calc has REALLY been doing, I check the log, and delete the outdated entries. Now I don't miss anything. I can put all of my cyclical activities (like weekly meetings) as repeating alarms which go off in the early morning. When I check the alarm log, I basically have an activities list for the day. peraino@gmuvax.gmu.edu peraino@gmuvax.BITNET
bill@thd.tv.tek.com (William K. McFadden) (03/19/91)
In article <3794@gmuvax2.gmu.edu> peraino@gmuvax2.gmu.edu (Bob Peraino) writes: > You can use the smaller units to accomplish this. For example, if, for >a repeat interval you put in 365 days, it shows up as 52.1428571429 weeks, >the largest unit it understands. I understand what you're saying, but it's >not impossible. Doesn't work for leap year, though. Probably the best solution is to write a control alarm that figures out when to reschedule itself. Example: the daylight saving time routines that were posted here a while back. >Unacknowledged REPEATING alarms are NOT pending. This, of course, makes >some kind of sense, since if it's pending, it won't repeat. Try setting flag -43. The manual is pretty confusing about this flag. What it does is delay rescheduling of a repeating appointment alarm until you acknowledge it. While this prevents multiple occurrences of an alarm between acknowledgements, it is usually not a problem. Flag -43 has no effect on control alarms. -- Bill McFadden Tektronix, Inc. P.O. Box 500 MS 58-639 Beaverton, OR 97077 bill@videovax.tv.tek.com, {hplabs,uw-beaver,decvax}!tektronix!videovax!bill Phone: (503) 627-6920 "SCUD: Shoots Crooked, Usually Destroyed"